Ella Sky Bar Madrid — Restaurant in Madrid

One comes across Ella Skybar when researching for where to dine in Madrid and the terrace pictures start popping up, that’s when you get hooked, however, I’d say Ella is precisely about the pictures rather than anything else.

Firstly, accessibility. Since there was not enough information available online, it took me at least three emails to figure out about Ella’s wheelchair friendliness. Once they said Ella was fully wheelchair accessible but with a couple of steps before reaching the lift, other time they said the terrace was tight yet wheelchair accessible, and finally they said the restaurant was accessible rather than the terrace. Facts are: There are more than a couple of steps before reaching the lift but there is a stairlift to help with those; the lift reaches the dining room, which is wheelchair accessible, comfortable and spacious; the terrace from where most of the pictures you see are taken, is not wheelchair accessible; there is a nice view from the dining room but limited to a handful of tables, for which you are charged extra; if seated anywhere else, the view is null and all of Ella’s appealing is gone.

Secondly, the food. Overall, I’d say it ranks on the “good” tier, which might sound a bit coarse, but we need to bear in mind we’re taking Spain here, and as proven throughout our trip, off-the-chart good food is not hard to find. As starters we had the papas “arrugas”, which were somehow dispirited compared to others we had; the shrimp, though not bad, was far from spectacular; and as main course we had the pulpo, which felt overcooked and crispier than desirable; and also the solomillo, which lacks greatly compared to whichever American steakhouse. Regarding cocktails, so unmemorable we switched to beer.

Finally, service. Although not rude or uncourteous, service felt somehow unprofessional. It felt like the waiter was covering for the actual waiter, not very knowledgeable nor explanative about the menu, looked distracted in spite of waiting no more than 3 tables, and tried to remember the order rather than taking notes, which resulted in marked delays and waiting.

In a nutshell, the view from the terrace makes Ella. If you’re a tourist you might want to stop by and have a drink while enjoying the view, have a few pictures and move on. Still, if you choose to dine here, be sure to have a reservation; for some reason guests were being turned down despite 90% of the tables being empty, which makes me assume all...

We stayed in a hotel on the street Gran Via 47 and booked including breakfast. So the breakfast was at the Ella Sky bar on Gran Via 42. The bar itself is very nice, the view, the furniture and the music (chill out or acoustic- very relaxing). The buffet was okay. As a hotel guest you can choose one dish from rhe menue on top, like avocado toast or french omelette. So actually this place has potential to make your morning delightful - BUT then there is this HORRIBLE managenent and service !!! You wouldnt believe its true but we went there on friday at 10 h and ordered within 2 minutes (they didnt ask, WE went to find someone behind the bar). Then it took 40 minutes for our toast and egg to arrive. Breakfast is until 10:30 h so before our food was served they started to clear up the buffet! I begged the very unfriendly, not english speaking server to leave at least the juice. When our omelette came we had nothing from the buffet to combine with it - except one glass of juice. The next day (saturday) was even worse. It was a completely nightmare how bad service can be. There were many guests, much more than on the day before and all empty tables were still full of the remains from the guests before. Around us all of the tables weren't cleaned within the hour we spent there. And guess WHY we spent an hour at this place....again we waited 40 minutes for an omelette and a piece of bread with 2 pieces of avocado on it. There were about 6 people standing in front of the buffet waiting for bread. It took the servers 20 minutes to fill it up. I have NEVER seen something like this before! For me there was nothing to put on my sandwich because they only served 6 types of meat - no cheese. (I am vegetarian.) The staff is unfriendly and completely over-burdened. I never had such a bad service...

WOW. I should have read the reviews before coming because it would have saved me a lot of hassle.

First of all I made reservation here having NO idea that was essentially a useless endeavor. When we arrived we were told we could go upstairs and have a seat in about 15 minutes. We had to pay for voucher to use when we went upstairs. (that was fine with us as we figured they were trying to prevent people from just going up there without buying anything).

As soon as we got up to the rooftop we realized we were in fact NOT getting a spot. It can only be described as a MESS. Literally people everywhere, trying to get drinks, trying to get spots, discarded drinks were on EVERY surface. It was not being cleaned or maintained. Spots to sit were completely full and there was no staff supporting any kind of queue to find a place. You would essentially have to be rude to get a spot and we are not that kind of people. We were in a "sort of queue" at one point for a spot and then rude people just took over. We couldn't find a place to be and could not find a clean surface.

It was horrible, it took about 25 minutes to get a drink from the bar, we had them as quickly as we could and got out as quickly as we could. Had we not purchased the vouches downstairs without knowing, we would have just immediately left.

Truly horrible experience I have nothing good to...