Hotel Zeppelin San Francisco — Hotel in San Francisco

This is a 3.5 star review, but can't leave half stars! We stayed at Hotel Zeppelin for 3 nights over Valentine's Day weekend. You really can't beat this area, TONS within just a few minutes' walk and public transportation stops nearby also.

The hotel is definitely edgy and unique. At check-in, you're offered a complimentary cocktail, which is a really nice touch being that drinks are anywhere from $13-18 in SF. It's a premade mix of some sort and rather strong!

The hotel's decor is rocker chic, a music lover's dream. It is physically very dark, not a bright and airy decor scheme. The rooms are on the small side, but that's not unexpected for SF. There's still room for everything you need, but know that the beds are smaller than you're likely expecting. Possibly a queen, but I believe it was a full, as we felt it was smaller than what we have at home. We especially liked the shower setup with full-sized toiletry bottles, and the Nespresso coffee.

There's an impressive game room downstairs from the lobby that's free and a lot of fun. It was crowded every time we tried to visit, but still awesome. A huge sitting area with a big screen also, great for watching whatever game is on.

Now a couple of cons, the reason for my 3.5-star review versus 4. We visited both hotel bars, a total of 3 times, and had horrible service every time. Not just sorta, but absolutely horrendous. Went unacknowledged for several minutes all 3 times, twice had menus plopped down in front of us without so much as a word, one time we were acknowledged with a, "Yeah?" when we caught the server's attention to ask for our bill. We eat out and travel a ton, and ESPECIALLY by SF standards, this was ridiculous. Would absolutely not recommend either the restaurant or the lobby bar for this reason, unfortunately. Also, every booking site says the hotel has robes, but it does not. Not a huge deal, but worth noting. We found the smallish bed and pillows rather uncomfortable as well.

Finally, the hotel has a quirky layout. You may have to travel between two elevators to get to your room in the second tower, and it's quite a detour. Again, not a big deal, perhaps a quirk of old architecture, but worth noting so you know what to expect.

Overall, we would probably stay again for the fun game room and awesome location, but I wouldn't go out of my way. Service is a...

I stayed for one night. Zeppelin doesn't provide airport shuttle service, but their concierge is all inclusive and can arrange (at a price) for transportation. I personally took BART to Union Square and walked the half mile to the hotel. It's in a pretty decent area--not terribly seedy, right across from the JW Marriott, next door to Honey Honey, reasonable noise level for downtown San Francisco. Making the reservation on the phone was a nightmare, with the attendant unable to communicate properly and having a tough time understand me, in turn. Checking in was a different story. I had an early flight in and didn't realize it was so warm. I called the hotel to see if there was any way to check in early as opposed to five hours after I landed. Now, I don't know for sure (until I look at my credit card statement) if they charged me extra to check in early and check out a bit late, but they were very accommodating and did have a room open at the time of my call, so I give them bonus points. The hotel has a very modern, eclectic feel. Staff are dressed casually and very laid back, but seemed quite professional in their conduct. The cafe and bar are contracted separately, but it's a full espresso bar (Signal Glass, I believe) and worth a sip in the morning. Absolutely delicious, if the bare minimum. The room I got was a queen--the bed was rather short, even for me (I'm 5' 4"), so I'd recommend a king or larger for anyone bigger. There was a light outdated look to the walls, but the furnishings (including a large, interactive Android television, white leather lounge chair, complimentary water and espresso machine, peace sign lamp and sleek modern shelves and drawers) fit the atmosphere very well. The bathrooms were small, but clean. Same for the room: small and narrow, but on the third floor and away from most of the noise. Walls were rather thin, but thankfully it wasn't particularly noisy during my stay. I can't say Zeppelin is worth more than the $200/night I paid--in fact, it's more of...

The hotel's overall look and feel were awesome, however, it fell short in a few ways.

First, I booked this hotel for a week long stay to celebrate a 10 year anniversary. I was in touch with a front desk employee about setting up something special in the room for when we arrived, and he let me know he could set up some wine, chocolates, and roses in the room. Once we checked in after our long flight from Florida, I was disappointed to see none of this was in our room. I had to awkwardly call the front desk about what was supposed to be a nice surprise for my boyfriend. They apologized and sent up some wine.

Another issue we had was that our fridge was broken for our entire six night stay and the hotel didn't seem to want to do anything about it. We were sad to see the restaurant was closed (their website didn't mention this when I booked back in April), and the front desk guy said to just "Order something from GrubHub". No recommendations or anything. So, we did that and put the leftovers in the fridge. It seemed barely cold, so I cranked it up all the way and hoped it would cool down. Well, this didn't happen. The fridge was completely dead, with our takeout food inside. It smelled horrible when we opened it. We let the front desk know, said we'd be out for the day (which we were) and came back to zero updates. The next morning, we let them know again. They said they'd send someone out to look at it. This proceeded to happen for a few days: us letting them know our fridge was broken, them saying they'd send someone out. We never got any updates and it was tough not having a fridge during our entire stay to keep drinks and food in there.

It was a nice hotel and we still enjoyed our stay overall, but we wish the staff would have been more attentive/cared a bit more about the issues we had. I know we traveled during COVID, so the luxuries of room service and having a restaurant and bar downstairs weren't possible at this time, but general service/attention could be improved on...