Villa d'Este

One of the best hotels I've ever been. The place is a dream and the service and personnel are amazing. Breakfast by the lake will be one of your best experiences. Totally worth it

This was a family trip…we had 3 garden view rooms total. It is quite simply a beautiful hotel with magnificent grounds. The service was exceptional…no request was overlooked. Definitely a bucket list place! Thank you to the entire staff…we’ll be back!

This was my 3rd stay at this property over a long time; returning with wife and kids, it would be 3 generations of our family being here. We were upgraded to the presidential suite, which was spacious and well appointed, although I preferred the bathroom in the connecting room 134 which had a standing shower and more standing space. Food is pricey but everything we had was great. My son loved the pizzas out on the terrace for lunch. Breakfast was great and dinner on the veranda was lovely; this is one of the few places that still has music and dancing during dinner and into the night and the piano player is fantastic. One of our dinners was at the Japanese-Italian fusion outlet and we actually liked it. The hotel has great facilities with indoor and outdoor pools (with a bathing suit dryer), a pretty good gym with skylights, and a sauna and steam room. The indoor pool is open till 8 while the outdoor pool closed at 7 in June. We did a boat ride arranged with the hotel along the lake and enjoyed it; we did not think you needed a speed boat as the lake is not all that calm and it was nice having some covering on the boat. The hotel arranged a hike in a nearby village that went up high over the lake and we enjoyed that as well. Service was friendly; one concierge really looked after me well after I got injured during a bicycle ride, and he was good about arranging taxi to the airport which cost half of what the hotel transfer would have cost. I didn't see any hint of snootiness from anyone, and nobody charged me 7 Euros for a bottle of water while I was on property. I've seen reviews and remember past visits where I had some different experiences. The only pain point we had was a bike tour that the hotel arranged which did not go well. The tour went across the border into Switzerland and was not particularly interesting. The guide did not seem to know what time the tour was supposed to end and did not speak English well enough to communicate well with us when we tried to shorten the tour and agree to an ending time. The guide was really poor; he lost all 3 of us somewhere in Switzerland right in the middle of a street in town because we were not fast enough for him and he didn't look to see that we were there. He lost my son once. He eventually found us. I didn't feel sorry because we were not advanced riders and he should have figured that out after an hour instead of berating us and telling us the tour would end an hour later because we were too slow. The tour was offered as a beginner's tour. I fell at the Swiss border and I don't think he was around to notice and didn't offer any first aid when we returned to his garage. I don't know if this was just a bad guide or a bad tour, but the hotel was really decent about it and didn't charge us for the tour. But hotels are supposed to vet these operators, and I suppose they were not happy about it either. A few tips: there is a flea market in town on Wednesday mornings. You can buy nice women's clothes from the back of some of these vans. The optical shop was open till 7; they have nice styles and very friendly owners, and fixed my glasses after the bike fall. For a cheaper lunch, try the Giordano hotel in town which has a decent restaurant. Overall, you will spend a lot of money at this property but it is beautiful throughout and they are upholding the best of hotel traditions. Treasure it while it remains an independent property and true to its values. The people who work there are dedicated to this.

very nice hotel with history on LakeComo the lake is very nice you can take a boat ride the staff is very good the rooms are very large and very comfortable and very clean it is worth the effort and the money we paid despite the fact that it was expensive as a hotel

We were fortunate enough to experience this amazing property as part of a larger trip to Spain and Italy for our 10-year wedding anniversary. We have been to Lake Como one time before but stayed at another (still iconic) property. Villa d'Este is in a league of its own. The public spaces are incredibly well taken care of, the breakfast spread is beautiful with ample selection, and cocktails each night in the piano bar was so special. Our room, while just labeled a "classic" room, was incredibly spacious, with a walk-in closet, seating area, and large bathroom. For a property of this age, everything was in top shape and well cared-for. What makes Villa d'Este special is how the team makes you feel. We were fortunate enough to befriend the bar manager, Riccardo, who recognized us each time we ran into one another, and even gave us a tour of the impressive kitchen operation ahead of dinner service one evening. What a special surprise! We will not hesitate to return to this iconic property.