My wife and I were nerveous about this hotel. Our hotel in Florence booked it for us so we didn't know what to expect. We drove around in circles and couldn't seem to find the hotel. It had a tiny sign as it was in a residential building on the second floor. We were travelling with another couple and between the 4 of us we had a lot of luggage. There was no bellman, no valet and there is also no where in front of the hotel to park to unload. We had to block the small amount of traffic for a few minutes while we unpacked the car. All that said here's the surprise:
-beyond the second floor door is a beautifully decorated, luxury hotel
-excellent, refined, just-enough-help staff
-fantastic breakfast buffet (fruit filled croisants & pastries)
-large rooms (compared to the other rooms we stayed in Europe)
-excellent water pressure and hot water
-close to the Trastevere, Palantine Hill and the Coliseum
-actual air conditioning (not a fan)
-I should mention some people like 'a view'. I saw 2 rooms, niether had one.
Overall we were very impressed with the attention to detail the hotel has, like small towels for your feet for the cold tile floor when you get out of bed, coffees and teas in the room, etc. We enjoyed our stay very much and the hospitality made us feel like it was our home away from home. (I was going to add pictures but their website's pictures are spot on.)

I have to travel very often to Rome and I always go to the Locanda, they make me feel at home and very welcome. I love the hotel and the people there.

I was horrified to read the review of the Locanda- we had already booked a room there for June 19-22. With trepidation, we taxied to the hotel and checked in. I am not sure what happened with the Austrian traveler, but we had a wonderful time- our room was clean, cool, and quiet. The staff was very helpful and informative. The breakfast served was a delight, especially the hand-squeezed blood orange juice.

I found nothing wron in this hotel and would certainly go back again, as had many of the guests staying there. True, there is no fancy sign or doorman, but it is a wonderful surprise to go up the stairs and walk into a grand little oasis. Our visit to Rome was made all the better by this fine establishment.

Locanda Cairoli is a total rip off. It is located in a residential appartment house. There is no entrance at all, you enter this hotel through the usual pathway that leads to an appartment house that you share with the residents. The lobby to the hotel is located on the second floor accessible through a very slow elevator. The rooms are unbelievably small with probably 20 cm distance from the walls to the beds. The bathroom is built very very cheaply and is dirty by the way. By no means this hotel can ever have got a 4 star rating. I think this is a real fake and they are doing most of their business with penaltys towards customers that book it on the internet (the web page looks quite nice) and cancel when they arrive and see the hotel in real life. In fact this is exactly what I did. The tried to charge my credit card with ridiculous penalties. But fortunately I managed to block my credit card account quickly enough. Now I have to order a new credit card from my cc firm.

I can only recommend not to get close to this hotel. When I was in roma I went on to the Westin Excelsior which is a five star luxory hotel. Their rack rate is 430 and i managed to negotiate that down to 265. So that is only 15 euros more than locanda cairoli. The Westin is a most splendid hotel as you would expect from 5 stars luxory. I think the price difference between the crappy locanda cairoli and the excelsior is just ridicolous. Do not book it!