Gale Chicago

Check-in was easy and service was very polite. The room was clean and furniture was comfortable, but it was a bit warm and the air conditioning didn't do much at all. There is only one ice maker in the building it seems, on the 2nd floor. It's a great location! Parking was $50 for 24 hours, very nearby in the Hancock tower. We were able to drive in and out of the parking garage as many times as we liked during the 24 hours.

I was excited to see the hotel was being renovated and booked a room with their grand opening special rate for a short trip to Chicago. My partner and I have stayed at the Raffaello (this hotel's previous name) multiple times before, and the last time, in Summer 2019, I was disappointed at the air quality in our room. I've seen a couple recent reviews that indicate a rocky re-opening so my expectations were low, but our experience with this stay was very positive. The reception staff was friendly, and the overall experience was on-par with or above what we were used to from previous visits. We enjoyed the redesign of the rooms. We lucked out and were upgraded to a suite because they didn't have enough single rooms ready when we checked in. We love the location of this hotel for exploring the surrounding neighborhood and Michigan Avenue. I can only say we had a positive experience, and we will certainly be back. The only thing we missed was enjoying a drink at Drumbar; I really hope that will be part of a future visit! **Updated 8/6 – I saw a review elsewhere that mentioned that the glass shower partition didn't keep water from spilling out onto the bathroom floor, and that did happen in our room, as well.

The room was beautifully decorated and the location was perfect for everything we wanted to do, unfortunately that was the extent of the good qualities. There was noise coming from the bathroom all night, making it impossible for us to get any sleep. When we mentioned it to the front desk they said they would send maintenance to look at it, but they never came. The walls are super thin. There was no one else on our floor the first night but the second night we heard the entire conversations of the rooms around us. The view from the room we were given was terrible. It looked down into the alley. Super romantic for an anniversary. Luckily we just needed the room for sleeping but with the noises from the bathroom, the room wasn’t even good for getting rest. The customer service was also terrible. We weren’t offered a new room or a discount on our stay. It was hard to even find someone at the front desk. Overall I wouldn’t recommend this hotel to anyone and I definitely wouldn’t stay again.