Carillon Miami Wellness Resort

We had a fabulous stay here! Rooms were spacious and well appointed, service excellent, and beach/pool area perfect size. Staff was helpful and friendly. Location excellent - walking distance to great restaurants and a Publix across the way. And a special thank you to Alex and Jem who assisted us with specific room requests.

I booked online for a nice relaxing weekend with my best friend. A vacation away from kids and my life. Online the room was listed on their website as a one bedroom suite with kitchen. There was nothing at all regarding views - didn't mention city or beach. Apparently I am supposed to know that if you don't see the word ocean view and nothing is listed in the description then I automatically get a city view. This translates to construction noises during the week and loud cars on weekend in the early am . When I got there, I asked Chris J if I could please switch to a better room - ocean view with balcony, I was willing to pay for it and was very disappointed to find out that they were sold out. She said there is nothing she could do and then that was it. . I explained to her that it was very misleading on the website regarding the views. She didn't care... it was sold out. The next morning (Saturday) I was woken up to car alarms and honking - very loud at 730 am. I called down and spoke to Chris J at the front desk again. I can't believe she is hired to help people and be the "front" of the hotel. She was rude, talked over me , and even had the gall to say "there is no construction on the weekends" implying that i was lying. I asked her if she wanted me to record a video of the noise since she didn't believe me. She was not professional at all so I asked her if maybe she could throw me a free coffee or make it up to me in some other way. (said with a smile) Getting away for five days is a luxury and to have to wake up to loud noises was frustrating and disappointing. She replied that the hotel is not connected to the dining - its a separate entity. That was her response. I asked if there was anything else she could do then. She said she could refund me two days only of the resort fee ($50 a day ) . I said thank you. When I got my bill she had added the two resort fee to my bill instead of subtracting it so I had to speak to a billing expert to get that changed. Honestly she needs to be trained on customer service. Spa was really great and fitness class and gym were also great. The people that worked in the spa were kind and professional.

There’s a lot to love about the Carillon. The property is spectacular—wide private swathe of beach, a huge pool, lush grounds, beautiful, quiet rooms, great spa and spa techs as well as truly lovely beach staff. However, there are also some wrinkles with the soft product. Some of the front desk staff are great, but some are fairly sloppy. There is no doorman, bellhop, or concierge. The woman at the restaurant host stand is downright unpleasant. That attitude does not belong at a hotel claiming to be a five star. Also, the spa messed up one of my reservations which caused me to forgo a promo that I had booked. Finally, the Strand restaurant is not good. I was going to avoid it anyway after the unpleasant host, but the food quality is so mediocre that it simply wasn’t worth it.

DO NOT STAY AT THIS RESORT. Not only was it filthy, but they are well known for baiting and switching! (Unfortunately, we found this out first hand and later were informed by permanent residents at this property that it is a common occurrence). We booked our 1 bedroom luxury ocean view room nearly 8 months in advance, and planned our vacation around this being a luxury wellness resort. Prior to arrival, I called in to confirm my reservation and request an early check-in. (Booked and prepaid as a Premier Collection property through Capital One Travel, where we have priority for early check-ins, late check-outs, and room-upgrades when available) Upon arrival, no one was present to greet us in the lobby. We found an older gentleman sitting at a desk, so we inquired where/how to check in. He said she would be with us shortly. We waited, and were not greeted in a friendly manner at all. She took my name, asked for a credit card, had no other communication at all. Then, she said, “Your room isn’t ready” and tossed a “resort key” at us, without discussing the resort or amenities at all. I asked if she had a time estimate for our room, as we had called ahead and were made to think it would be no problem to have an early check-in. She simply said “I don’t know”. She said we would call us when it was ready, and discovered she had a completely different phone number for us than what should have been on file. I attempted to confirm that she had the correct reservation, but she wouldn’t confirm. She just wrote our correct number down and said she would call. We waited in the general area, as it was raining and we couldn’t explore anything outside. Throughout the next 4 hours, we watched as numerous people checked in and were given rooms with no issue. We also inquired several times as to when our room would be ready. She very rudely stated “ check-in is at 4:00”. So we waited. Finally, at 4:00 she came over, demanded my credit card AGAIN. I said, “you took my credit card earlier”…to which she replied “our systems were down”. Then how could she have looked up rooms, reservations, etc.? We get our credit card back, she hands us keys, and again—no discussion of amenities, resort info, nothing at all. Now is when it gets worse: We enter our room (located next to a noisy elevator) to an overwhelming putrid, musty odor that overtakes us. There were TWO giant air purifiers running loudly in the center of the room. We walk further in and realize we do not have an ocean view, but rather a view of a construction site and a giant dumpster. No water in site—not even facing the right direction. I go down to the lobby. The woman who checked us in informed us that “we gave you the room you booked. A city-view handicapped accessible room”. I showed her my email confirmation that showed exactly what we booked. She said “it’s not our problem, call Capital One”. I asked for management, but was told no one was available. I returned to the room, and called Capital One. They confirmed that I did indeed book a luxury ocean view 1 bedroom suite. They attempted to call the hotel several times but could not get through. They suggested I walk my phone down to lobby so they could talk directly to someone. The woman in the lobby then went into the back and brought out who she said was the assistant manager, Felix. Felix took my phone and immediately took it off speaker and put it to his ear. I said, “Please leave it on speaker so that we can all be part of this conversation”. He was annoyed, but agreed. It was MY phone, after all. He was argumentative with both myself and the Capital One representative. He said he needed to look up my reservation on the computer. He then disappears being closed doors WITH MY PHONE. I opened the door to see what was happening, and he started screaming at me that it was a private area and I have no right to open the door. He pushed me through the doorway, throwing my phone at me, while yelling that he refused to help me. “I’m not helping you, GET OUT”. (Thankfully, this is all happening during a recorded phone call with Capital One). Capital One did what they could to try to rectify the situation, but unfortunately to no avail. No other rooms were available, and moving to another property that late in the evening, and during peak spring break travel was nearly impossible. Not t mention I had prepaid $3700 for a luxury suite that the hotel refused to refund. We returned to the room defeated and, quite frankly, just wanted to salvage our vacation after our horrific ordeal. IT CONTINUED TO GET WORSE. The odor in the room was apparently from urine, as the carpet was riddled with stains around the couch, as if a dog had lifted it leg around the entire couch. The couch cover was stained all over the seating surface. The carpet around the bed was also greatly stained. Even the lamp shade had a gross stain all over it. There were brown hand prints all over the walls—we weren’t sure if it was fecal matter, but we certainly didn’t want to investigate and find out. We checked back with the front desk, explaining the situation and showing them photos, but the refused to give us a different room. (There was a 2 bedroom available, but Felix refused). He said he could “send housekeeping up to try to do something with the carpet” but there was “nothing he could do about the lamp shade”. So for the next 4 days, we smelled horrendous odor (to the point that my sinuses were incredibly irritated), endured construction and elevator noise, noise from the ongoing air purifiers running at full blast, laying towels over stained seats and floors, all while enjoying a view of a dumpster. All that Felix offered was to waive the resort fees ($49 a day) and offered us 2 touch-less services at the spa. (Sitting in a salt chamber, or a sound bath.) He refused to cover the massages that we had already booked, refused to upgrade our room, refused to refund any amount. The rest of our stay was mostly unpleasant, as the reception in the lobby was nonexistent or ice cold. We felt incredibly uncomfortable, unwelcome, and frankly—unwell, considering the conditions in which we stayed. We will NEVER stay here again. THIS PROPERTY AND MANAGEMENT IS AN ABSOLUTE NIGHTMARE. They UNAPOLOGETICALLY ruined a vacation that we spent 8 months exquisitely planning down to every last detail, and took ZERO responsibility for their filthy rooms and lack of honoring my reservation. Stay ANYWHERE but here.

We have just returned from 4 days at the Carillon Miami. This was our second time there and again we were less than impressed. Given the incredible recent reviews, we wanted to give it a second try and thought maybe we missed something the first time. This time we had even more issues. First the Pros: -the size of our room was great. Large living room, kitchen, bedroom and bath. -lovely beach area with very attentive staff. -delicious and fun beach food delivered to your chair. -we had a delicious lunch at the restaurant and a great server. Cons: -front desk help very unfriendly and unhelpful -calling down to reception or concierge from the room is futile. No one answered the whole time we were there. I ended up walking down to address our concerns. -pull out couch mattress was the worst I have ever seen. It was literally like springs covered with cloth. Beware if you plan to have someone sleep on the pullout. -we had a terrible smell in our room, refrigerator and dishwasher. Housekeeping/maintenance did address the issue, but given what you are paying it shouldn't be an issue and was not fully resolved. -2 of the 4 elevators were broken the entire time we were there which made wait times long. It did not seem like anyone was working to fix the issue. -it states that rooms have a full kitchen, but we didn't even have a toaster and had to call down for one, no regular coffee maker. -our third day there we came back to the room at 3p and housekeeping hadn't been there. Tried calling down with no answer, so when I finally walked down was told we needed to arrange for our room to be refreshed. It had been refreshed the two previous days. Overall, our family had a nice trip together and really enjoyed the beach and pool areas, but room is definitely dated and needs attention and those we interacted with for any issues inside the hotel seemed less than happy to help.