Armani Hotel Milano

The experience is horrible and unbelievable! They are short staffed to begin with, front desk was ignoring calls and having my family on hold when they were calling from the US to ask for help. I was on the verge of passing out and could only text my family from home because my 112 call wasn’t going through. My family kept calling front desk asking to send help and they didn’t send immediate help!! I cannot believe I stayed over an hour and was scared for the other people that were with me. Please don’t waste your money with the poor service I experienced! I cannot believe this happened and I’m glad to be okay.

This is undoubtedly one of Milan's most iconic hotels situated in a perfect location about a 10 min walk to the Duomo. If you like clean lines and uber modern minimalist design then this is the place for you. The attention to detail is impeccable with everything from the ultra modren designer furniture, the catwalk coiffured staff to the sleek black complimentary toothbrush. The service is exemplary and the staff are attentive, available and quick to help. However, for us it was definitely style over substance. We spent 3 nights in a deluxe room, which was just about large enough to accommodate an ample king size bed and not much else. This led into a bathroom which was almost as big as the sleeping space with a lovely large bath to relax in after a hard day of designer shopping, and off which there was a very claustrophobic toilet in which those who have a daily practise in yoga definitely have an advantage in manoeuvring around than those of us with a more rigid spine. Next door is another equally shoebox sized  shower room, but the shower itself is really powerful once you figure out how it works. I guess the space in the bathroom is there to cater to those who need room to dress up to the standards expected by the Milanese jet set and then be able to do a mini catwalk while admiring themselves from numerous perspectives in the multiple ceiling to floor mirrors.  Unfortunately though, the lighting is quite poor in here and my wife found it difficult to apply  makeup with any degree of certainty. It all looks great but it's not particularly practical and definitely not designed by anyone who intends to stay in this space for anything more than a few days. A little more thought given to the proportions of the room would have greatly helped in terms of livability. 3 nights was ok but 4 would definitely have been pushing it! I think this is the entry level room and I'm not sure how it compares to other more spacious rooms where I would hope you would not have these issues. Nice pop up TV at the end of your bed to which you can cast your phone or log in to your Netflix or Prime accounts. The bed itself is very comfortable, as you would no doubt expect with options for bed linens and pillows on request. Everything in the room is controlled by an iPad which is very cool (initially) but after a while you feel like just wanting to flick a switch rather than scrolling through multiple menus just to adjust the lighting in the room, or close the curtains, or adjust the volume on the TV. And at 3am in the morning it's no fun when you just want to switch on the bathroom light without 1. Being blinded by the ipad, 2. Being blinded by accidentally turning on all the lights to max or 3. accidentally activating the pop up tv or opening the curtains. The Spa at the top of the hotel has a large jacuzzi but no pool.  We used it a couple of times and it's definitely a relaxing space to unwind. All in all, we had a great stay. The hotel is not to our taste and we wouldn't hurry back but that shouldn't put you off. No doubt the Armani Milan will certainly impress many and well worth a short stay if only to say you've done it. There are some very nice hotels in Milan in this luxury price bracket so do your research.