Hotel Ballast Wilmington, Tapestry Collection by Hilton — Hotel in Wilmington

This is the perfect example of the price is solely for the location.

Newer Tapestry collection Hilton hotel located in the historic district. Hotel is situated on the Cape Fear river and Riverwalk opposite the USS North Carolina battleship museum. Behind the hotel is a walkable, small business shopping and entertainment district.

Lobby is contemporary but comfortable featuring a 24 hour front desk (Jeannette is very sweet), 24 hour small convenience store, coffee shop (large coffee and large caramel macchiato was $10) and seating. A steakhouse is currently under construction and the bar/restaurant is located on the ground level. There is no complimentary coffee or tea in the lobby like most luxury hotels. Parking is either self-park ($20/day) or valet with in/out privileges ($25/day) and added to your room bill. You may call x2223 before leaving your room and your car will be waiting for you outside. 2 elevators are available and are quick but small. Mobility scooters and larger wheelchairs will have difficulty fitting into them. They also have the lobby music blasting at an uncomfortable level in the elevators. Hallways on room floors are pretty low so those 6 ft 5 in and taller might have to duck around light fixtures. Payments can only be made with a card or bill to the room. An ATM is available in the store and has a $4 transaction fee.

Our 6th floor room overlooks the river and battleship and is sparsely furnished. An in-dresser safe, a coffeemaker, a hair dryer and shower essentials are provided in the room, but no mini-fridge (Parents and elderly must plan ahead for any refrigeration needs). Complimentary bottles of water (2) and a sleeve of 2 sugar cookies are waiting for you in the room. The room is equipped with tiny trashcans, a TV that needs replacement, a pillow top mattress that's long overdue for replacement, rock hard pillows, a short faucet that's barely attached to the very shallow sink, a shower door that doesn't close completely and feels like it'll fall off the track when you pull it open/closed and a front door that is missing a threshold. We were in the room until about 10am but were out of it until about 1:45pm. Our room was not cleaned during this time even though housekeeping was in the next room when we left.

Edit: Housekeeping finally arrived at 3pm to clean and refresh the room as we were leaving to attend our affair. They also came knocking at 9am on our last day to confirm we are checking out.

The bar/restaurant has live music on Fri night and Sat afternoon on the patio and the night bartender, Elizabeth, was great. Buffalo wings were good but quesadilla and onion rings were greasy. For that and 4 drinks the bill hit $86 with tax. Next morning was the breakfast. No hostess at the stand and we stood there getting weird looks from patrons until we made our way into the restaurant where someone said to seat ourselves. Staff walked around cluelessly and actually asked me how to make a mimosa? Skip the buffet unless you want to eat instant eggs, greasy sausage, flavorless pastries and tart fruit. Even the OJ was tart? Restaurant is open until 10pm and the bar until 11pm.

Amenities are limited to a pool (no hot tub) and that's about it. There's an outdoor bar but it looks like it's been closed for months. This is primarily a convention hotel. There were 2 during our stay. The indoor bar was overrun by conventioneers by 9pm.

For $300+/night, we're wholly disappointed.

Edit: In good faith, the hotel refunded us some of the charges due to our disappointment. They are willing to do what it takes to improve your opinion. However, as other reviewers have commented as well, with some proactive improvements in service and investments in room quality and amenity options, they would greatly improve the overall experience and no longer need to rectify with guests...

The Hotel Ballast Wilmington is hardly a Five-Star hotel as they claim on their website. I would describe it more like "a bait and switch" One-Star hotel. My husband and I arrived on 3/17 for a five-night stay, but we left after one night because the hotel was a major disappointment. Based on the pictures shown in the Hotel's website, as well as their write-up, it being part of Hilton's Tapestry Collection for instance, we were expecting to be staying in a luxurious hotel. Wow, was this a full-blown bait and switch advertisement campaign on Hilton's website! The main elevator was small, cramped, and dirty. Getting off the elevator onto our floor, we were first greeted with a strong, musty oder. The hallway was poorly lite, had a strong musty smell, and the walls were in great need of a fresh coat of paint. The baseboard skirting all along the hallway was filthy, and also in need of fresh painting. For a five-star hotel, the hallways were absent of high-quality molding and trim work; instead, a single strip of cheap chair-rail molding, that was dirty and needing to be painted, ran the length of the hallway. Walking into our room, we were again greeted with a strong musty, moldy smell, and for good reason. The bathroom shower had many spots and inch-long streaks of black mold in the grout on the shower walls and floor, and circling around the shower handle. There was a seven inch section of the shower ceiling paint peeling away, with a two-inch piece of paint dangling from the ceiling. Also, on the shower ceiling were nine dime-sized mold spots. The baseboards in the bathroom hadn't been cleaned in months, as seen by the thick, yellowish colored layer of dirt on the top of the baseboard, especially behind and by the side of the toilet. So, you know why the dirt on the baseboards was "yellowish" in color!! The toilet was bolted into the wall, vice onto the floor, so every time one of us sat on the toilet, it creaked and moved, and felt like it was going to pull off the wall. In our room, by the entrance door, there was a large section of the baseboard that was separated from the wall, exposing bare drywall. There were two large cracks in the wall on either side of the door, extending from the baseboards to mid-way up the wall, with drywall peeling away. A section of the ceiling outside of the bathroom was cracked and peeling, and badly stained, from an old water leak. The baseboards throughout the room were filthy, some covered in a black dust that clearly indicated they had not been cleaned in easily six months. The door to our room had a two-inch gap from the floor, which allowed so much light and noise into our room. The A/C vent had black mold inside of the grate and it gave off a horrible moldy, musty smell when we ran it. Our room hadn't been thoroughly cleaned from the previous occupants because the room's telephone was greasy, the counter tops were dusty, and the room had an overall uncleanliness feel to it. Down the hallway from our room was the employee/freight elevator, with its two doors propped open, exposing nine bags of trash piled up, cleaning mops and supplies scattered on the floor, and a generally gross smell coming from the area. We were forced to stay in the hotel for the night only because the other hotels in downtown Wilmington were booked; otherwise, we would have left immediately upon seeing the condition of our room. We have pictures of our room to back up our complaints. The interior hallways, the elevator, and our room appeared to us as if Hilton had purchased a 1970s era roadside motel but never renovated it. Worst of all, The Hotel Ballast did nothing to try to salvage our stay, or even offer to cover our night's stay, other than to offer us some Hilton points. I will never recommend this...

My sister & I were on a business trip for her work that the hotel hosted. So let's break down our stay by the categories listed. ROOMS: Our room was great very clean with a beautiful view. I gave it only 4 stars because of 2 reasons. 1st reason was we were only given 2 towels & the towels were a little on the small side. Both my sister & I need 2 towels each (one for our hair & the other for our bodies) I didn't make a big deal about this because it's not a show stopper for me. However what cost this rating a star was the tiny toilet. Our toilet was a wall mount toilet & apparently installed incorrectly. It literally was on the floor. If you picture a prekindergarten toilet and how low they are to the ground.. That's how low our toilet was! Normally this also wouldnt be an issue but my sister has 2 bad knees & it made it rather difficult to get on and off the ground to pee. What was absolutely comical was after many many many drinks from the bar & having to pee. It because a drinking game on who can make it to the toilet without ending up on the floor! SERVICE: From the time we pulled into the hotel we were greeted with nothing but smiles & Wonderfull people! We had an issue with our room key & it was immediately addressed. The people at the front desk always gave great recommendations on where to eat. One day I was having issues booking a flight so I went to use their Office/ work space/ iPads but unfortunately they were dead, but the man at the counter went above and beyond and actually booked my flights right from his computer & even printed me all my confirmation information that I needed. One thing I was a little disappointed in was due to my sister paying for the hotel I was not able to put the points under my Hilton Honors account as my sister doesn't have an account. Anyway.. Ok Ok so I saved the best for last... THE HOTEL BARTENDER: This man is a GOD to the Bar world!! I am suprised people are not fighting over this heavenly man!! His name is ERIC. Y'all let me just say I am a mom of 4 & my sister is a mother of 2. We literally drink every 2 years when we go to these work conventions! I never know what to order because there are always new things out & your taste buds always change & honestly every bartender makes things differently. But this wonderful man took the time to talk to me and ask me some questions about my taste palette & then he got to work!! You could see the smoke pouring out from the top of his head as his wheels were spinning. He began grabbing this and that.. fresh fruit.. leaves of this and that.. I mean I was like what the hell.. I mean this man was as determined as every woman with an idea from Pinterest! I swear this man reached into a magazine and pulled this drink out of the hand of one of the Kardashians & placed it in front of me. This drink was as beautiful as he was! Ok let me try this.. WOW oh WOW it tasted just as amazing as it looked. You couldn't even taste the alcohol (as for the previous comment about late night drinking games :) After I was blown away with the unbelievable talent that Erik has he actually was so nice and had a conversation with my sister & I. He was equally a great human being. He is ranked top in the world & has traveled all over learning about different drinks and flavors to complement the palette. He has mastered the art Mixology in my book. Erik made this stay for my sister and I an experience we will not forget. We will be telling our Bar story at the future conventions to come! LOCATION: Everything was so close & in walking distance. Everyone was so helpful & restaurants were great. the local food...