Rafter's Gastro Pub & Accomodation — Restaurant in The Municipal District of Kilkenny City

I organised my brothers stag in Kilkenny and needed a comfortable, central location that could accommodate a group of 18 at a reasonable enough price to suit everyone's budgets while still being a nice place. Very happy with my decision to go with Rafters: the location was smack bang in the city just a stones throw from Kilkenny castle, the rooms were all nice sized and very clean, with comfortable beds/linen and hot showers. The pub downstairs (as well as the rooftop terrace) made it perfect for a meeting point and a base before our weekends activity's too. Throughout the whole booking process Gerry was very friendly and accommodating, even when the numbers chopped and changed right up until two days before the stag. The free breakfast included was generous and tasty and hit the spot, and while we didn't have the evening meal as we were booked elsewhere, Gerry very kindly gave us a nice amount of finger food in place of the meal in the early afternoon before heading out for the day, which went down very well. All the staff behind the bar were lovely, and overall the whole group felt it was a great place to anchor ourselves for the weekend. For anyone organising a stag or hen or any large group in Kilkenny, I don't hesitate to...

After checking in to room 14 via the pub and taking our own luggage up three flights of stairs, we found our very small room to be about 78 degrees F (25 C). This is on a day when the outside temp maxed out at 70 degrees F (21 C) so the room is probably stuffy in general. We opened the window, but that didn’t help. After asking staff if there was a fan we could use, we were told there wasn’t one. Then, to make matters worse, a live band started up at a pub directly across from our window. So our options were to close the window and boil or leave it open, pray for a breeze, and try to sleep through a live concert. We decided to walk to a different hotel and luckily they had just had a cancellation so we switched to the much much much nicer hotel (and it was less expensive to boot). The owner of Rafter’s refused to refund any of the money we had paid even though we had called the day before to ask about noise levels in the “family” room we had booked. We were assured noise wouldn’t be a problem which turned out to be a flat-out lie. Save yourself some money and hassle and steer clear of Rafter’s. There are a lot of better (and cheaper) options in...

Disgraceful… DO NOT STAY HERE. My friends and I stayed in rafters for the Easter bank holiday weekend. From the minute we arrived we were treated extremely poorly by management (specifically the owner). The owner was cheeky, unwelcoming and straight up rude from the get go. On check in, he insisted we paid a ‘refundable’ €300 security deposit upfront along with our booking fee which was not disclosed on website or in the booking t&c’s and felt like it was something he just decided on when he took a look at us. From chatting to other residences over the weekend no other party was made pay this fee upfront. On check out, once rooms were checked and all was in order the owner was unable to refund us this money immediately after promising us this would be the case (was clear he hadn’t requested this fee before). Overall the stay was horrendous, very unwelcoming and not somewhere I would recommend to anyone. The owner of this establishment needs to take sort out his attitude and quite frankly freshen up on his...