Graduate by Hilton State College — Hotel in State College

Oh how I love the design of this hotel! With it being in a college town - it definitely gives a college feel.

When you arrive, there's a lot of parking options - from the street to a garage. With me catching a shuttle (which arrives at the airport every :15 & :45 of the hour) it pulled up to the entry doors inside the garage and there was a fireplace going. That was the beginning of the dope ambiance - as cold as it was that heat was appreciated.

Once inside and you're at the elevator to check-in on the lobby floor which is Floor 2, you have to play with the elevator a little because despite the cool renovations, the elevator is a little outdated. You'll press the floor you're on, the floor 2 - weird, I know but it works :)

Option check-in, you'll receive your room key which is just like a college ID - so creative, right! Oh - the restaurant is located right behind the check-in desk and they close at 10pm. I arrived at 9:20ish-pm so needless to say, I had to hurry so I could grab fries and my fave, a lemon drop martini! But I was so amazed when I got on the elevator and the doors open to my floor! The wallpaper looks like a ceiling to floor library! Ahhhhhh so lovely!

I always use the Do Not Disturb sign during hotel stays and even that was super cool! It says "studying" - again, how cool!

The room was really chill and cool! A bench when you first walk in for you to sit or either place your luggage. The bathroom was very bright and I liked the black and white aesthetics - the wallpaper had black outlined ice cream cones against the white wall ... interesting, ice cream cones in a bathroom. Either way, great look to me!

The resting area had a comfy bed - there was an old school telephone (and works!) a nice chair to sit and write at - complimented with a small table to slide over and use. There was also a microwave in the room, which I love because what about those odd times during the evening when you don't feel like leaving your room ...

Oh let me add - the hotel staff was super friendly! I didn't need anything but every encounter was pleasant! I really enjoyed my overnight stay there - My next flight to work wasn't until 4pm so I had plenty of time to explore the city - which I post another review on that soon!

I'm looking forward to another stop there again! And when you visit, take the time to walk around the hotel and enjoy the little small things they offer.

OH - one more thing - for real this time! There are two lounging areas right across from the elevators. They offer plenty of seating and they offer games you can play like Jenga, etc. they also have a set of two chairs that is paired with table tops equipped for chess - another great offering!

Clearly you can tell I enjoyed my stay here - and I hope...

This hotel is charging for a 5-star experience based entirely on the design but absolutely not the service. I’ve had better service at motels. I was traveling with an infant and made sure to book a king suite to have a sink, extra room, and space for the travel crib next to the bed. I let the hotel know this ahead of time multiple times by text (as they state they want to be contacted) and in fact asked that our room be ready a little earlier than check-in if possible, so they can’t say they weren’t expecting us. unfortunately we didn’t get in until evening and very close to my baby’s bedtime so we needed to get into our room ASAP. We were given a regular room, which we discovered upon walking into the room—not at the front desk. When I went down to get the correct room they informed me they didn’t have a clean king suite and it would be maybe an hour but she couldn’t say definitively. The employee didn’t even apologize. She ended up giving us a queen suite, which turned out to be very cramped with the second bed in there so we had to climb over a queen bed to get to the bathroom because there was only one place to put the travel crib (this wouldn’t have been an issue if we’d been given the right room). The bathroom had a lot of mildew and the whole room is dusty. The website said there was ice on the third floor (which we needed as we were traveling with milk for the baby) and I went to three and found an empty room with a hookup for water and no ice machine (see pic). A different front desk employee had no idea and had to look at the hotel layout to confirm in fact that I had walked into what was supposed to be an ice machine (LOL). You can only contact the front desk by text and they take a few hours to respond, which meant for us having to go down to the lobby to ask two simple questions. At checkout, the front desk employee didn’t ask about our stay or say anything except ask if we wanted a receipt. To top it all off, they charge you a $20 amenity fee. For what…I don’t know. All in all this was a really stressful and poor experience. If you’re traveling with kids especially, don’t come here. All of this could have been improved if there was any effort to apologize or acknowledge we didn’t get what...

I was excited to return to this hotel after reading about the purchase by Hilton that integrated the Graduate and its properties under the Hilton umbrella because I am a Hilton Honors Diamond member. Let's start with the good. We checked in on Saturday around 3. We had a wonderful check-in with the gentleman on the desk. He seemed very knowledgeable, professional, and very personable. We traveled to State College for Arts weekend and booked 2 rooms for ourselves and our kids. The gentleman who checked us in even moved rooms for us so we could have joined rooms. The rooms are decorated in a similar fashion and are very welcoming although a bit behind technology wise, but we were satisfied up to this point. The elevators are slow, and the parking is a bit too sketchy to charge $15 a night, but it is what it is.

Now, to the bad, aside from being charged a ridiculous rate for arts weekend, we also paid for an early check-in and a late checkout. Fine. So at 11:30 on Sunday, the housekeeper angrily banged at both doors to our hotel rooms. Waking us up and the kids. When we answered the door and tried to explain to her that we had paid for a late checkout, she was snotty, rude, and unapologetic, essentially justifying her behavior with "well nobody told me." As if being awoken as if the police were breaking down the door wasn't bad enough, the phone to each room started ringing shortly after with whomever running the front desk calling to basically tell us we had 20 minutes to get out or they would charge us more. So we rushed out of there like we were fleeing some foreign occupied land, not because we cared about the money, but because the whole purpose of paying for a late checkout was to actually sleep late and not have to awoken and get 3 children dressed and out in a relaxed fashion. In the process of rushing out, our middle child lost a few of his stuffed animals. We were going to extend our stay, but after that we decided to just leave. I found it to be unacceptable, and we will not be staying at this property ever again. I generally try to leave positive reviews, and rarely do I leave negative ones. This is one of those exceptions.

The lobby is...