Stayed here recently on one of their Weekend Breaks. We initially booked a King Club Room, but decided to upgrade to one of their 3 'Presidential Suites'.

Since our previous stay, you now have to pay £5 to park overnight, even as a residential guest - which I think is an absolute cheek!

Check in was prompt and polite and we were directed to our room - a few doors along from The Brassiere. Good sized room. The seating area has a decent sized 2 seater settee and table and 4/5 chairs. As well as a desk and chair for office type use. TV was rather old looking, but did have satellite channels as promised - freeview I think. General décor was ok.

The mini bar was supposed to be fully stocked, yet there was only 2 soft drinks and a bottle of water in there! However, these were complimentary!

There is then an archway that leads through to the 4 poster bed. Here there is another TV, with same satellite channels. Remote control can be used for both TVs. The radiator in the bedroom did not work, but the one in the lounge did. Thankfully it was not too cold!

There is an ample sized wardrobe with trousers press and ample hangers. However, no sign of the iron and ironing board, as mentioned in the description!

The bathroom was a reasonable sized, but not as big as expected for the style of room. The tiling looked very amateurish in places! Obviously a modern bath/shower attachment had been fitted and the tiles surrounding were cracked badly! The spa bath is just a normal sized bath, with jets and although doubled ended, so that two could bath, given it's size, made it very cramped indeed! The rather worrying thing, was that the water that was running into the overflow sounded like it was running straight under the bath! Yet we couldn't see any sign of any water coming out from under it and into the bathroom, so goodness only knows where it was going!!

There is a shaving mirror by the sink, that was fabulous - magnified. Even though the bulb in it had blown, the other lighting around the sink area was quite adequate.

All in all, I don't think I'd pay the extra for a suite again and would stick with their King Club Room instead, which is a similar size, if not larger, has a larger bathroom and a bigger spa bath!! As well as a seating area - 2 seater settee and coffee table!

The other benefit is that as a 'Club Member', you get to use the Club Lounge, which has free internet access, newspapers and complimentary refreshments - tea, coffee, soft drinks, as well as biscuits, fruit and yogurts! There is also complimentary continental breakfast if you want it.

After our complimentary Champagne Cocktail in the library bar, we ate in the Lion D'or Restaurant (there was a Dutch and/or Polish convention going on and The Brassiere looked quite busy and noisy), and found the food and service excellent - and the set meal was not much more (£27.50 for 3 courses, plus coffee and mints) than if we'd eaten in the Brassiere. Obviously like most restaurants, they make up the money in drinks!! The wine we had was £18.50 a bottle and the bottled still water over £7!! As for dress, my hubby wore jeans with a smart shirt and jacket and that was fine.

Booked through a long stay car park company on a park / stay deal , staying overnight at hotel and parking car in companys own car park about a mile down the road for £89 including a weeks parking and shuttle buses.
Found hotel to be welcoming, clean and comfortable and generally of a good standard.
The Hotel is a bit maze like with long corridors, but although we were down a couple of corridors and through a few doors didnt find it a problem and enjoyed our stay and this hotel provide a comfortable start and good base for our early morning flight.
Only disconcerning point was on arrival being greeted by a car park barrier asking us to take a ticket, which looked like we were going to be charged an extra fiver to park overnight, but this ticket was swopped at check in for another to allow free exit.

I cannot believe that this hotel comes so far down the list of hotels in Gatwick as its our favourite to stay in pre flight and we are always dissapointed if we cannot get in here.
I guess this is the reason for writing this review. Yes the place is not 21st century chic but this is part of its charm. I hate smoky rooms too but it will take time to get rid of all the smoke smell from some of these older hotels which have had smokers in for years...particulary this one with its woodwork and beams.
I have stayed in others around Gatwick including the Arora, the chequers, Ibis and the the Ramada..all a little souless and very often staff who speak little English.
Another thing I like about the Copthorne is the secure parking area, Its never been an issue yet in our last stay at another hotel dont recall which one our car had a big dent in the side door as the underground parking spaces were too close together.
I also love the cosy bar area.
Drinks are a little steep but we have a few and then usually get burgers or sandwiches on roomservice and get an early night.
Have to agree the shuttle buses could be a little more frequent and have at times waited for late scheduled buses in the morning but this is trivia.
I dont agree with previous reviews that this hotel is expensive, we have paid more at others for not half as good and this is a London airport!!
One last thing which you dont see very often is feedback from the management..good to see they are listening and acting on negative feedback, well done you!!
P.S. (will expect a good rate on my next stay) Only joking!!!!!

We stayed here for a dinner dance run by our social club and the event, meal and venue were really good although they need to organise somewhere else for the smokers to stand other than just outside the door.

The room and the bathroom were ok, but smelled of old smoke which was vaguely nasty. Otherwise it was clean, pleasant and comfortable.

Breakfast was a complete shambles and they seemed to be unaware of the numbers of people who were staying at the hotel which was odd. We had to collar someone and ask for tea and coffee after waiting quite a while - and then there was no breakfast on the buffet.

Breakfast, along with the strange man who kept knocking on our door and trying to clean our room well before our checkout time made this a disappointing experience in all!!