Aescape is a robot massage located inside the W Hotel; it has been wildly promoted on social media, so I had been looking forward to trying it during this trip to Seattle. My husband and I both booked massages, his was before mine. What I immediately noticed was that when I arrived, the front desk staff was very dismissive. The woman who I asked first where the spa was, gave me a snide look and said "we don't have a spa" and threw a card at me for the robot massage. I went upstairs to the third floor where it is located, the bathrooms were locked, and it was literally one room, nothing more. So I went back downstairs, tried to find an open bathroom and information about where to check in. I finally found someone else since the woman continued to ignore me who then directed me to another bathroom and told me I could wait on the third floor in the open area. I waited there until my husband came out, we talked very briefly and he went on and I continued to wait past my appointment time. A staff member finally came the only thing they changed was the tissue paper on the face rest and then gave me a brief introduction to the machine. I immediately asked if they could increase the temperature because it was freezing in the room. They looked at the thermostat which didn't appear to reflect the actual temperature, told me to change into the provided garments and they would see if they could get someone to adjust it. They never showed back up again.
So I start the machine, immediately determine that I can't see the screen without my glasses which of course is not ideal for a massage, I get it set up and get about 40 minutes through and by that time am so freezing that I put my glasses on (they are on the screen below me) to see if there is anything adjustable and realize that the screen is covered with dead skin from goodness knows how many previous guests. At that point I realized that they had not cleaned anything between my husband's massage and I and later after asking my husband, he had the same experience.
I stopped the machine with the pause button and got dressed and left. You then have to go back downstairs to the lobby, give them the key to the fourth floor (I guess you have access to something up there after the massage). When I did, I mentioned to the woman (that woman again who was the only one there) that it was filthy and cold and I had stopped I half way through. All she could manage was "ok." So ... there you have it. Ok. I have a discount code if you want, but you will not catch me back there - not at the robot or at the W. read more