Palace Hotel & Spa Buxton

The location is right in the middle of Buxton, close to shops and restaurants. Set upon a hill, I'm sure some rooms have a wonderful view, though we ended up in a room facing the utilities/kitchens, not so sightly. The room itself was clean, but decor and use of space was underwhelming and odd. Given, the shape of the room was not your standard square/rectangle so they made it work well. Only 1 pillow per person when we got there, we did check the cupboards so had to make a late night request which was kindly met by a personable gentleman named Dave. There was also no bulb in the lamp, which again, Dave from front of reception kindly fixed for us. The amenities in the room are basic, but if you ask reception, you can get your shaving kits etc (which I was grateful of!). Now let's talk extra charges - most hotels will include this in costing but upon arrival, it's £5 per day parking - not too bad but unexpected. Worst was, you pay up front for all the days, but on day 2 there were absolutely no parking spaces for me, my husband and our 4 month old. Again, thus is where front of house step up, and I also really feel for them (will say more on this later). A lovely African lady (apologies forgot your name, but wanted to give you a shout out!) on reception offered me a refund and said that we could park across at the train station, where we would still have to pay for more parking. However as I mentioned we had a 4 month old and walking across very late at night didn't see an ideal situation for us the nice lady then offered for us to park in front of her car blocking her in and that should come up and knock on our door around 11:00 p.m. in order to let us have that space again not an ideal situation especially given that we had a baby with us but it was the best that we could do in that situation.

Room was very hot! No windows opened and the fan was useless and very noisy!! You couldn't put the kettle under the tap so had to struggle to fill it in the bath, the towels weren't very clean . breakfast was excellent and bar staff were lovely, excellent location for the town but very hilly coming back.

We recently stayed at the Palace Hotel in Buxton and, unfortunately, left feeling disappointed. While the building itself holds undeniable historic charm, it’s clear the property has seen better days and is in need of serious attention to bring it back to its former glory. The biggest letdown was the dining experience on our first night. We both ordered the pork belly, which arrived smothered in a beige-orange sauce that overwhelmed the entire dish - any other flavours were completely lost. The restaurant appeared understaffed, and our drinks didn’t arrive until we were nearly finished with our mains. To their credit, the staff did comp the drinks due to the delay, but the overall experience put us off dining there again. The dessert, a cheesecake, seemed to be cut from a tray and was cloyingly sweet, with little depth of flavour. The room itself was unremarkable. We’d booked a double but were given two singles pushed together, topped with a thin mattress cover that did little to disguise the gap or add comfort. The room and adjoining bathroom were dated, and the bathroom’s extraction fan was not strong enough to deal with moisture properly. All in all, the hotel has potential, but it’s clear that it's currently coasting on its once-grand reputation rather than delivering a genuinely comfortable and enjoyable experience. The staff were pleasant and friendly, however this did not balance out the issues that made this a disappointing experience. We'd recommend spending less and stay at the local Premier Inn, which we've found to be a standardised comfortable stay that is better value for money.