The rooms are on the small side, but perfectly workable. The first room we had was a bit older and all the lights were on a master switch - annoying since the two of us adapted differently to the time change. The staff kindly found us another room. We could turn on one light at a time which worked better for us. This room seemed bigger, but the bathroom was very small. I don't know if all of the rooms are different on just the first one we had.
The hotel is in a quiet part of town, and the rooms were very quiet! The bathroom floors were heated, which was wonderful. The wireless internet worked well and was quite fast - much better than most free internet. The breakfast was excellent with a wide variety of foods - lots of herring, yoghurt, cold cutes, scrambled egg, sausage, breads and jams. Coffee, chocolate and tea were available 24/7 from a machine in the dining area. The light evening snack was wonderful when I was just too tired to go out and find something for supper.
Finally, the staff was always helpful and pleasant. All-in-all this hotel is a winner. The only way this hotel would score higher with me is if it cost less. However, it was not at all out of line with other hotels in Oslo.

This hotels pretends to be a higher-scale boutique hotel and charges like one, but is somehwat closer to an average roadside motel. It may look lovely on the outside but looks can deceive...
My husband and I were assigned to a small room in the old part of the hotel. The walls of the corridor had flaking paint and bits of concrete coming off, and our room smelt foul because of, it turned out, some very sour pillows in the bed. We were then given another room in the same part. This room didn't smell sour but had more of a mouldy scent to it (the bathroom being the prime suspect) and the bathroom was so tiny that we banged our heads in the sink every time we sat on the toilet. The room wasn't exactly soundproof either as we were awakened 3 times (!) during one night by some couple in the same corridor having loud sex!

As for breakfast? Pretty average, nothing special, more canteen style really. They claimed to be fully booked that weekend (hence we couldn't upgrade to one of their newer rooms) and had still only one (!) waiter during peak breakfast hour. People were lining up for tables while he ran around trying to clean up cups and plates and mess, while not having time to attend to refilling of coffee machines etc etc.

And service? Seemed like the reception staff was hired for the weekend from the nearest high school. We arrived back at our room after a full day in the city and realised our room wasn't made yet. When we asked about it we were told they had forgotten our room and would attend to it soon. When my husband asked them to do this when we were going out for dinner in a couple of hours he was told that the cleaning staff was about to leave so if we wanted our room cleaned, we would have to do it then. Isn't it amazing that a hotel this size doesn't have some cleaning staff available after 4 pm?

As for location, great!

Great place. The best hotel in Oslo.
A true " feelgood" place. The receptionist Einar is a Star.

The gabelshus is a nice hotel in and old building in a very quiet residential area of Oslo, although its only a few minutes from the tram stop into town (literally 2-3 stops to centre and also walkable) the entrance and breakfast rooms are very nice, the check in staff were extremely helpful and told us places to go nearby for a drink and also where to explore in town (Head over to Grunerloka for night-life and nice bars) ur room was at the back and in the old servants quarters, and was quite a nice attic room. it was quite large and had a large bathroom with bath and natural light. the bathroom could be a bit more up to date but it was OK (note there were electric wall heaters and no radiators which might not be enough during the winter?) the room was very comfortable with a nice bed and wardrobe space, a comfy chair and two big windows looking out onto gardens and residential properties. It was very quiet and we had 3 very relaxing nights sleep there. The evening buffet was great, some people have commented that it was not enough for dinner but we found it a very good selection of hot and cold food (salads, cold meats and cheeses, fish, nice bread, cakes etc.) and it saves you a lot of money as eating out in Oslo is very pricey. Also its really nice that you can make tea, coffee, hot chocolate and waffles to have at any time or take back to your room (the cinnamon buns were excellent after a long days walking!) the breakfast room is large and in two sections, one part is more of a formal dining conservatory. Overall the hotel is very relaxing, comfortable and we would stay there again.