As Janelas Verdes - Lisbon, Portugal 

the bed ruined our stay
Posted: Thu, Jun 26 2008
Staff were terrific and helpful. The library a comfortable and inviting place to relax but the bed was awful...so uncomfortable we found it difficult to sleep. Also the air conditioning blew but rarely did any cool air emerge. We were surprised to learn that we were charged for breakfast when we checked out...14 euros each. We stayed 2 nights. Also felt a bit claustrophobic. A bit too far from the centre as well.

As Janelas Verdes was just right!
Posted: Fri, Jan 25 2008
Our group of 4 adults recently stayed at As Janelas Verdes for 3 nights; it was JUST right! The public rooms (living room, breakfast room, and the fabulous library with a terrace and wonderful views of the Tejo river with Cristo Rei and the 25 de Abril bridge) feel very cozy and inviting with comfortable furniture and judiciously rich decor. We agree with a previous posting about the silk flowers & plants, but we also like the fact that our very reasonable rates clearly did not include the costs of extravagant exhibits in hotel lobbies, where we typically derive little direct benefits. (And though fake, the flower arrangements were actually not in poor taste!) The breakfast buffet was abundant, with pastry, juices, hot tea & coffee and hot milk, fresh fruit salad, cereal, eggs, bacon, cheeses (including fromage fraiche -- yum, yum), yogurt, etc. ... There is no restaurant on site, so one would have to go out for lunch and dinner, but there are enough small and good coffee shops and restaurants nearby, and when inquired, the staff cheerfully offered to deliver fresh fruits and home-made sandwiches to our rooms. Our own double superior rooms were quiet and sufficiently roomy, with comfortably firm beds. The nights were turning cooler when we were there, and both rooms had very comfortable temperature controls. The bathrooms were also sufficiently roomy with marbled floors, tiled baths, and Molton Brown bath products. A small but cute touch was the complimentary port in each room. There was no minibar in the rooms, but the library has a very reasonably priced stock of beverages, and this certainly encouraged our daily sojourns to the library to enjoy the magnificent views too! Nightly turndown service was discreet. Service was consistenly and uniformly excellent, as all previous reviewers have stated. While we were there, we saw the staff going way out to help another guest with locating the guest's luggages, which had been lost by the airlines and had nothing to do with the hotel. The staff even offered to call the hotel on the guest's next destination to make arrangement for delayed arrival and/or delivery --just in case! We knew that As Janelas Verdes is a relatively small hotel and were not looking for any huge lobby with rows and rows of registration staff, but even then, check-in and check-out were both efficient and attentive. The hotel is in the Santos district, right next to the Luxembourg embassy and down the street from the French embassy. We knew that the hotel would not be quite centrally located for sightseeing, but after spending the day sightseeing, it was actually quite nice to come back to a relatively less bustling area. We used taxis a lot to go places, and in general, it costs the 4 of us about 6-8 Euros to go from the hotel to various places in town including going to the Gulbenkian one night for a concert. We ourselves did not encounter any problems with street noise, with one of our rooms facing the garden in the back and the other facing out with a view of the Tejo. In all, we felt that As Janelas Verdes had just the right combination of comfortable space and excellent service for us to feel very much welcomed and to enjoy a very relaxing and pleasant visit to Lisbon. We definitely would stay here again when we return.