Mills House Charleston, Curio Collection by Hilton — Restaurant in Charleston

I’m a hotel snob. I travel constantly for work and spend over half the year in hotels. I know what I like and what I expect for the price I’m paying.

Charleston is a city I visit often, but I’d never stayed at The Mills House until now. Normally I stay in modern luxury hotels. This time I chose it for the location near Washington Square.

If you like a basic Holiday Inn or Courtyard room but want a prettier lobby and restaurant, this place will suit you. If you expect comfort, room quality, and amenities to match the price, you’ll be disappointed.

The lobby looks nice but is uncomfortable. When it’s hot, it’s hot inside. Fans sit behind the front desk for staff while guests sweat. When it cools down, it’s still damp and now cold.

To give credit, the blonde from CCU at the front desk was exceptional. She seems to be doing the job of five people and handles it well. The valet team was also great, every one of them friendly and efficient.

The room itself was disappointing. The oversized sofa eats up the space, there’s no dresser, and the tiny dark closet has no light. No iron, only a steamer, and the only place to hang clothes near an outlet is the air vent beside the smoke detector.

The bathroom is even worse. The counter barely fits a toothbrush and a hairbrush. The lighting is awful for makeup, there’s no makeup mirror, and no tub, only a shower without a handheld sprayer. If you don’t want to wash your hair, too bad.

There were no shower caps or slippers. If you move the bath mat to the sink so your feet don’t freeze, you’ll have to move it again to open the door. And if you want to hang your robe after a shower, your only choice is a hook beside the toilet, which means your robe touches the toilet. It’s disgusting.

The bathroom door handle has been replaced with a silver one while every other handle is bronze, and it’s installed backward. You have to turn it the opposite way of a normal handle. Small thing, but it screams no one checks the details here.

Housekeeping was the worst part. A blonde housekeeper came by for turn down service on Friday. We’d left the room 30 minutes earlier and had a bottle of champagne on ice. When we returned, she was in the bathroom turning the bottle to pour it out.Who does that? The bottle was new and chilling. She joked it was seconds away from being gone, which wasn’t funny. I startled her so she missed the sink and spilled my champagne on the floor which she didn't clean. She’d also thrown away my hair elastics and the tissue paper I needed for my fascinator to travel home. No one trains staff not to throw away guest belongings or champagne during a stay?

The location, pool, patio, and bar are nice. About 30 percent of the staff deliver what Charleston is known for — warm, professional service. The rest look miserable or uninterested. At the hostess stand, I stood waiting until I said hello first. After what seemed like an eternity, the hostess finally looked up and said “Hey.” No greeting, no offer to help.

The Mills House has a great location and a pretty lobby but subpar rooms and inconsistent service at luxury prices. From now reading the reviews here, it appears the General Manager replies to bad reviews with the same type of “we apologize” and "we aim for" message every time, yet nothing changes.

The Mills House doesn’t just lack hospitality. It lacks the basics of a...

STAY AWAY - PREPAID RESERVATIONS NOT HONORED - BOOK ELSEWHERE

I showed up at the Mills House at roughly 11pm with my wife and son and here is what transpired:

Valet garage was full, was told to self park in the garage adjacent to the hotel - left my wife and son to take our things into the lobby to wait for me to check in Lugged my bags from the garage to the lobby where I attempted to check in...after waiting for a large group of folks all check in and head to their rooms. I was told to wait as they "checked on our room before giving us the keys". This was a flag obviously, at 11pm our room should be ready. Desk attendant returned to let us know that not only was our room not ready, but in fact the hotel was entirely unavailable. Was told the hotel was oversold, and "this happens frequently." which made me feel zero better...as I stood there with my wife and son looking at me for where we would be staying. Was told to go get my car, put our stuff back in and head to the Bella Grace Hotel about 5 minutes away and they would "take care of us". I was not given a name of someone at the hotel, any description of the type of property, type of room, etc. We found the new hotel, couldn't find where to park...ultimately ended up using the valet there for $53 a night. We were able to check in and got a very small room with 2 beds.

Additional background: My room was paid in full prior to arrival. We arrived the day of our reservation only to be told we didn't have a room...after standing in the lobby for the better part of a half hour. This reservation was booked (and my card was charged) on 02/03/2025. The reservation showed up in my HHonors app, we had a valid reservation. We were checked in. My card had already been swiped for incidentals on the room. This was not an inexpensive reservation that I had paid for. The total charge for the night was $1,043.29 after taxes and fees. I guess in the eyes of the Mills House, that isn't enough... Where I come from a $1k a night hotel room should beget a little better service than that.

What I’ve learned after looking at the hotel’s ownership group, Davidson, is that both the Mills House and the Bella Grace (where I was re-routed) are in its portfolio of properties. Therefore by overbooking a prepaid reservation like mine at the more desirable property, I can easily be turned away and made to stay at the lesser cost property. Pretty ingenious way to maximize revenue for Davidson, having me pay $1000+ for a $559 room, and leaving me little other choice on a Valentines / Holiday weekend in Charleston at 11pm. Good job maximizing occupancy at the more expensive property!

Oh yeah, and I'm HHonors Gold...so loyalty doesn't matter at the Mills House.

I have not yet seen a refund for my room, I was given a menial amount of Honors points (which may get me the type of room I paid for at an off peak time at a...

I had to share a BED with a stranger--- not a room, A BED!!! We had our annual managers conference at this hotel. When we arrived, we were put in the courtyard to wait on our rooms to become available. We waited alright… hours and hours we waited. As a company all of our employees were respectful and kind. We were patient and understanding. We were finally informed that they had overbooked the hotel by 50 rooms! The only option was to put us in king rooms (2 people per room) instead of the two double bed rooms we had booked. We smiled made the best of a bad situation. To say that this was the worst sleep of my life would be an understatement. I am not accustomed to sleeping in a bed with a stranger I just met that very day! There were several other issues during our stay that included: Lack of promised WiFi in the conference space, cold food, and some of the rudest employees I have ever encountered. It’s not about making a mistake. We all know that can happen, but it’s about how they dealt with it after the mistake was made. We were met with a rude employee at every single corner we turned. They were not apologetic. They were not accommodating. They were not kind.

On our last night we had an awards presentation booked on the roof. They did tell us that quiet hours started at 10:00pm. We were DONE by 10:06 and downstairs by 10:08. They, in return for our patience with regards to the HOURS we waited on rooms (only to sleep with strangers), called the police on us! Yes. We were past quiet hours, but only 6-8 minutes. After all they had put us through during our stay, it seemed only appropriate to allow us a small grace period. No one in our group was being unruly or obnoxious. We were loud (over 150 women—it’s going to be loud in any situation), but not rude or disruptive. This hotel does not do well accommodating large groups at all! They do not make right on bad situations and the customer service was terrible. The room was clean and the cleaning team was friendly. The courtyard is adorable. The hotel on the outside looks extraordinary. It was nice, but not as unique at the outside appearance made it seem like it would be. The lobby area was very well maintained. I would not under any circumstance recommend this hotel to a friend, colleague, or stranger.

Our corporate office spent a very significant amount of time, money and energy in this retreat. We used the hotel for not only the rooms, but also banquet space and catering. They spent almost a year planning this and really tried to make it an amazing experience. The biggest thing most of the attendees really are taking away from the experience was how terribly we were treated...