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About
4.5
#16 of 47 hotels in Chester
Location
Rooms
Value
Cleanliness
Service
Sleep Quality
As a hotel, bar and restaurant, Oddfellows brings a fresh and unique experience to Chester. The 18 exclusive boutique bedrooms each have their own charm and combination of iconic and contemporary furnishings. The design of the bedrooms is inspired by architect John Douglas who designed Chester’s landmark Eastgate Clock, cinematographer Peter Newbrook who brought the Oscar-winning Lawrence of Arabia to life, and the illustrator Randolph Caldecott whose humorous images were simply irresistible. Complete with Cultivated by Elliot Hill - and The Secret Garden - a unique indoors/outdoors oasis; Oddfellows provides the ideal escape...
Star ratings are intended to indicate the general level of features, amenities, and services to expect. This property is classified according to Giata.
HOTEL STYLE
Quirky Hotels
Trendy
Languages Spoken
English
Location
20 Lower Bridge Street, Chester CH1 1RS England
Oddfellows Chester
1,897 reviews
Getting there
Great for walkers
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The Oddfellows Chester hotel delights guests with its distinctive bohemian decor and comfortable rooms, appreciated for their cleanliness. Nestled in a prime location, the hotel offers easy access to local attractions. While the quirky amenities and dining services are a hit for many, some guests suggest improvements in these areas, including the introduction of a hot breakfast.
Opinions on the value proposition are varied, with several travelers questioning the hotel's pricing relative to the services received. The atmosphere is generally praised, though noise has been an occasional concern. Service experiences range from attentive to disorganized, indicating inconsistency.
Location
Convenient
Atmosphere
Bohemian
Rooms
Quirky
Value
Expensive
Cleanliness
Mixed
Service
Inconsistent
Amenities
Underwhelming
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My partner and I booked to stay at Oddfellows in February using a virgin experience voucher we received for Christmas. We stayed on Sunday 2nd February. When we arrived the staff were lovely and greeted us but we had a couple of questions about what the voucher included to make sure we understood, the only thing I’d suggest is that the staff got more informed on what the vouchers are and what were included as they were just as confused as we were- especially when it came to the evening meal. The manager (I’m assuming) did confirm everything to us which was good but really the staff should know what they entail. The room was gorgeous, no issues with this at all the bed was so comfy! The staff were great and the woman at the bar at night was bubbly and chatted to me when I was ordering drinks. Great location to stroll into the shops and local bars. The breakfast was lovely in the morning too. We did get charged too much for something which I queried at the reception desk on check out and again this was sorted with no problem. Would stay again and recommend!
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Date of stay: February 2020Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from Katie Bentley, General Manager at Oddfellows Chester
Responded 11 Mar 2020
Dear abiwalker98, Thank you for taking the time to let us know about your recent stay - and a very belated happy anniversary to you! We are delighted that the stay was a success and that you enjoyed your room and dining experiences. We'll definitely take note to make sure the whole team are up to scratch on experience vouchers, so thank you for this feedback! We hope to welcome you again soon, With best wishes, The team at Oddfellows
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A very quirky hotel with a great room. Booked through booking.com for £129.50 including breakfast, it was plentiful, I felt this was good value in a city location. There are stairs from the front door up to the reception area and many stairs to the rooms, we were on the third floor. The room had a comfy round bed, good pillows, great air con, decent sized tv, coffee machine, kettle and fridge. We didn’t eat in the restaurant but the prices seemed reasonable, drinks prices were varied in value, a pint of Cobra £4.50 a glass of Prosecco £7.00. On checkout you are given a discount card if you are staying in the pepper street NCP car park. The cost of the car park should of been £20 but with the card was 9.80. A great visit, pleasant staff, good location and I would recommend it and stay again.
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Date of stay: August 2021Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
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This was our second visit to the apartments. This time we stayed in apartment 3. I preferred 4. It was lovely and clean with comfy beds. However I had a few criticisms. The bedroom was stuffy, we couldn't open the window above the bed so condensation was a bit problem and there was no window in the bathroom so I felt it wasn't aired adequately. We were a chair short round the table and an oven glove missing but this was quickly rectified. The bowls and cups were tiny, you can only get one shredded wheat in the bowl and even then you have to snap it in half and us Lancashire folk like a decent cup of tea! 😁 Other than that we really enjoyed ourselves. The apartments are perfectly situated for exploring Chester, they're quiet and safe.
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Date of stay: December 2019Trip type: Travelled with friends
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
We have stayed here before in the loft, albeit a few years ago, and absolutely loved it, hence the rebooking. This time we were in the Caldecott rooms and we really felt the clientele and ambience had changed. These rooms overlook the bar which was packed-the music and general noise really affected our stay until it stopped at 11pm. We felt this was possibly in response to the current climate and hotels needing to promote their bars, but we just weren’t expecting it and therefore it wasn’t the experience we had booked for. Following a really lovely meal at Shrub (also reviewed) and a few drinks, we just didn’t wanted to be greeted with that volume. We also hadn’t appreciated quite how open plan the shower room, and in particular the toilet, was, with a gap at both the top and bottom of the partially frosted door. None of this is something we felt we should complain about-we simply did not expect it.
Depending on what you want out of your stay, this may be a great option-the location is great for restaurants and the decor, although a little tired in places, is quirky. Customer service at the front desk was ok, other than a long wait as the member of staff was on an enquiry call. The parking recommended at Pepper Street is incredibly tight too, but the discount from the hotel approx halves the cost.
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Date of stay: June 2021Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from Katie Bentley, Guest Services / Front Office at Oddfellows Chester
Responded 11 Jun 2021
Dear Ambassador765671, Firstly thank you for taking the time to send us your feedback. We rely on hearing back from our customers to make sure we can give you the best service possible, so your thoughts are totally invaluable to us. Our garden bar has definitely been busy as Covid restrictions have eased, with lots of people very keen to meet friends and socialise again. We are so sorry this was detrimental to your experience, and your stay. We hope you will come and stay with us again, and please do advise us of any problems during your stay in future so we can attempt to resolve them for you during your stay. We would have been happy to try and move your room for example if we had known of your disappointment. With very best wishes and thank you again for your feedback, Best wishes, The team at Oddfellows
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Really enjoyed our stay in the apartment. Specious and we’ll worth the money.
Really clean and a car park space included.
Great location for the town.
However went for a drink and after time spent in the bar my feelings of the bar area changed very quickly.
Tables have a sign on saying ready to use table had been sterilised. So all good. Wrong one table used four times never cleaned. Just glasses removed and sign placed in centre of table. Social distancing some times. One way system is set up but staff and customer don’t bother. Brought up with reception but a blank with no reply just oh ok.
Track and trace system not being followed. Staff member said if you can do it great but if you can’t don’t worry.
The stay was great just worried about the Covid set up.
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Date of stay: August 2020Trip type: Travelled with family
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We’ve been waiting to visit after our trip had to be postponed from earlier in the year so we were really looking forward to our stay. We booked 1 night in a Caldecott Classic. We arrived early so stored our luggage until check-in at 3pm. The receptionist was friendly and explained that toiletries and tea/coffee facilities had been removed due to Covid and asked if we would like them to take to our room. We replied yes and were handed a flimsy plastic bag with toiletries & tea/coffee mixed in together, the hotel have really missed a trick here as it could have been presented so much better in a recyclable bag or box. On arrival to the room we were disappointed to find that the room had been stripped of all furnishings (cushions/bed throw etc), I understand that it is necessary but some mention of it would have been useful in the ‘welcome’ email sent a few days earlier. There were no wine or water glasses, coat hangers etc. We could have brought these if we had known. Also no hotel information etc. Breakfast had to be booked for a set time with no room service. Finally we were very unprepared for the open shower/toilet in the room, this isn’t made clear in the description. All in all it was quite a disappointing stay in what should have been a special occasion for us and definitely not worth £175.
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Date of stay: October 2020Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from Katie Bentley, Guest Services / Front Office at Oddfellows Chester
Responded 8 Dec 2020
Dear MissTLancs, Thank you for taking the time to send us your thoughts on your stay. It is only with feedback from our customers we can improve our service so we thoroughly appreciate it. We had to make amends to our normal services in light of covid - and the guidance for hotels across the country has been standard in terms of rooms amenities and stripping back of extra furnishings. Any hotel following those guidelines would have had to follow similar procedures. We do love your idea of a recyclable box for the toiletries instead of a bag and will look into this. We will also look into the way the communication makes these changes clear. This has obviously been a time of uncertainty and huge change for all hotels and we can only apologise if we haven't managed to get it right. But your feedback will help us so thank you! With very best wishes, The team at Oddfellows
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I’m not one to leave negative reviews normally but felt the need to in this case to inform anyone thinking about staying of our experience.
We stayed Saturday and Sunday night as we were completing Chester Marathon, and then had a flight to catch from Liverpool airport early the Monday morning which involved us leaving the hotel at 3am.
We specifically booked Lady Mary’s loft due to the double bath which we thought would be relaxing post marathon. It is quite obviously the main selling point of this room so you would assume you could run and use both baths at once. It was disappointing to find that it was impossible to fill both baths at once. The water pressure was terrible and after 30-45 minutes we had to give up as both baths were only 1/3 full and the hot (warmish) water had ran out and was running cold. The shower was also running cold. This was about 4pm on Saturday. Post marathon (Sunday ~7pm) we did manage to run and fill one bath but even then it took about 40 minutes and was warmish at best.
There were a couple of other minor annoyances that I wouldn’t even normally mention or think about (tea bags and shower gel weren’t restocked - really annoying when you are sweaty post marathon and struggling to move so don’t feel up to doing all the stairs unnecessarily to tell reception), however the main issue was that the we asked the hotel reception to book us a taxi to the airport for 3am for our flight. They assured us this would be booked by the night-porter when he came on shift and wrote it on a piece of paper and left it on the desk. 3am comes, we come downstairs and ask the night porter who knows nothing about the taxi. This is simply unacceptable. He then tried to phone the taxi company they apparently partner with but had no answer (likely due to it being 3am Monday morning). We were extremely lucky there was one Uber driver in the area who was able to accept our ride and pick us up by 3.45 so we didn’t miss our flight. The Uber driver said we were very lucky as taxis in Chester are really hard to get and he just happened to have dropped someone off and was heading home to Liverpool when we requested on Uber.
The actual hotel room would have been nice if the bath / hot water situation was fixed and the location is great, but the hotel is massively let down by the service and it’s staff. The reception staff seemed disinterested in general and weren’t even apologetic about the taxi situation. Feels like a 3* hotel with 1* service.
The hotel feels more like a bar / restaurant with a few rooms just FYI if you are thinking about booking. For a similar price I would book the Grosvenor next time…
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Date of stay: October 2022Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from Oddfellows Chester, Guest Services / Front Office at Oddfellows Chester
Responded 29 Nov 2022
Greetings from Oddfellows Chester, I would like to take this opportunity to thank you for sharing your feedback with our team. I sincerely apologise that on this occasion your experience was not as you expected. We can assure you that we take all feedback seriously and that we will further investigate the issues you have raised to ensure that we improve upon the services that we offer. We sincerely hope to have the pleasure of welcoming you back in the near future in hopes that we can have the opportunity to redeem your opinion of our property and services once again. Kind regards, Reception team
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We have stayed here 6 years ago and returned for a birthday treat. I messaged in advance to let them know about birthday of my wife and asked for champagne and chocolates which they agree to do for a fee. We arrived and it’s ideally located in centre of city and we were checked in by friendly staff. We paid for a duplex suite with breakfast and dinner for £205 for one night. When we walked through the hotel to our room we noticed it had not changed at all In the 6 years and looked dated now. The room 16 we had was so tired and worn and had the same furniture in and the smell was horrible like egg and drains. Plus no champagne or chocolates in room too. We called and were moved to 15 which was better but still the Carpet was stained and the couch was tatty. The room was clean but on closer inspection it was just in need of a revamp or just new furniture and carpet as it smelled like they try to clean the carpet constantly and has a musty smell. The bulbs were gone in lamps and spot lights etc. The roll top bath is nice and bed is still comfy. We had lunch which was nice and dinner was al’acarte and was very nice and waitress could not do enough for us but in my view the place has lost its Charm and that modern sleek look it was known for and feels tatty now. It’s not worth the money anymore and feels like one of the many hotels that you can stay with friends while going out for a piss up. With all due respect to others and even the other couple who got put in room 16 after we did, how can people say it’s was amazing (but everyone’s standards are different I guess and not everyone has stayed before to do a comparison). The staff were great and try there best.
In a nutshell this hotel is ideally located and staff are great and food is ok but rooms are dated and worn and prices now don’t reflect the quality of experience so should be reduced and now there are other hotels competing and they have moved ahead of them.
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Date of stay: October 2020Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Response from Katie Bentley, Guest Services / Front Office at Oddfellows Chester
Responded 8 Dec 2020
Dear ahern 1988, Thank you for taking the time to leave us your feedback, and we have taken all of your points regarding the rooms in question directly to the management of the hotel to address them. We can only apologise if you felt your stay was hampered by them. Thank you for your kind comments regarding our team, we will pass these on and I know they will be very happy to hear such positive feedback. We're pleased too that you enjoyed your lunch and dinner. Many thanks again, With very best wishes, The team at Oddfellows
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We stayed here for a night in apartment 5 and can't compliment the accommodation enough. It is really attractive in presentation and offered 2 super king bedrooms with ensuite facilities and a separate cloakroom. The dining, living kitchen is well equipped with facilities and the apartment offers you 1 car parking space. The surrounding area is close to the river and castle wall walk. We found lots of nice places to eat and drink all within a very short walk of the accommodation.
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Date of stay: August 2020Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
I booked this hotel for my hubby's birthday as a surprise. I booked the Lady Mary's loft room for £269 bb advance rate.
On arrival the hotel and room impressed however we were let down by it lacking in the finishing touches that you should expect in a hotel of this standard.
Our room was amazing however there was no remote for the tv (staff couldn't find one) the lights round the mirror didn't work, the phones didn't work, the shower water was luke room and the freezer bag they gave us with items to make a drink with only has tea bags, milk and auger . No coffee and no stirrers. We got a tiny shampoo and conditioner and a bar of soap. No shower gel. No face cloths.
I had requested on my booking that it was my hubby' birthday, this wasn't acknowledged at all. This was disappointing. Other hotels have acknowledged this on check in which is a nice touch or pop a bottle of wine in the room.
We did complain and the mgr immediately agreed to a few drink each and refunded us £66.
The bar area is lovely and the drinks were nice. Breakfast was really nice and good choice.
For the price we felt let down.
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Date of stay: September 2020Trip type: Travelled as a couple
This review is the subjective opinion of a Tripadvisor member and not of Tripadvisor LLC. Tripadvisor performs checks on reviews as part of our industry-leading trust & safety standards. Read our transparency report to learn more.
Not entirely sure. Not through the front, but the room below us was I think, set up for those less able. My husband - not great on stairs managed on the single staircase up to 'the cottage' room then. But would be difficult now. I don't know about the rest of the hotel. Was just a great place, lovely people and very convenient for the middle of town.
I was a bit taken aback. My husband thought it funny! But, there was a sort of opaque modesty panel which ran around the 'cube' and a shower door which closed both ways. We were in the cottage room, so better ask about individual rooms.
There are more places to choose from in the Chester area.
PRICE RANGE
£104 - £172 (Based on Average Rates for a Standard Room)
ALSO KNOWN AS
oddfellows hotel chester
LOCATION
United KingdomEnglandCheshireChester
NUMBER OF ROOMS
18
Prices are provided by our partners, and reflect nightly room rates, including all taxes and fees known to our partners. Please see our partners for more details.
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