This small hotel of 8 rooms made use of its boutique status to give guests a truly warm and personalised experience that has for us been unmatched. My husband and I travel a lot and we have never met a more sincere hospitality staff. The staff were not at all the tips-seeking variety that we usually meet. Every exchange with them felt sincere.
The hotel goes all out to give rooms a personal touch. The decor was tastefully done and impressed us immediately. The moment I entered the room, I could almost feel the person who had done up the room. There were delicate details like the arrangement of towels on the beds. Breakfasts also had a homemade quality to them.
I believe there exists a good relationship between the staff and the hotel owners (whom we did see quite often during our 4 night stay). We went there in spring when most hotels have switched off the central air-conditioning. However, it was warm on the first night. It is not so comfortable leaving the windows open as there are sudden loud noises from passing traffic (not much traffic on the small lane, but enough to be disruptive) in the middle of the night.
The next day, we asked if the air-conditioning could be turned on, and the staff promised confidently that he'd make a request to management. For that one night, we had air-con! (The system was switched back to heating when the temperature took a drastic fall the next two days.) I truly appreciate this gesture to be flexible and accommodating -- something you will not find in the big hotels.
As we were travelling with my 1.5 year old toddler, we spent a lot of time in the hotel (afternoons for her naptime, and early evenings back). My daughter absolutely loved her experience and didn't want to go home. The common area was small, but homely, and completely satisfactory to my toddler. The staff played with my daughter everyday and entertained her with the little hotel bird.
During our stay, we had to make a trip to a very local area as we were buying a double buggy that wasn't displayed in most shops. Cengiz Demirli, the owner (with his father), was at the reception in the afternoons and he made phonecalls to make arrangements for us to view the buggy. He even got us a discount over the phone. When we were at the shop itself and had trouble with credit card payment and the shopowners could not understand English, Cengiz was so helpful when we called him to mediate the situation. He was also present to assist us during the delivery and setup of the buggy to the hotel the next afternoon.
We have many other lovely experiences during our rather intensive 4-afternoon-and-night stay that only you can appreciate if you were there. (=
Highly highly highly recommended. The hospitality and accommodation was THE holiday itself for us. It left us feeling so good about the people of Istanbul.
