The Blue Rainbow Apartments are tricky to review. I imagine the experience is greatly influenced by the amount of money you spend for the room you book.
When deciding to stay in Edinburgh for two nights I searched around the internet for hotel deals and found the Blue Rainbow (which was advertised as a 4/5 star hotel) was having a special deal for 50% off rooms. I jumped at the opportunity and booked their cheapest room ('a studio apartment') for 99 pounds/2 nights. A steal no matter what for the heart of New Town, Edinburgh.
When we arrived the exterior was lovely and the interior was very much of the boutique-style hotels. The man at the front desk was lovely and very helpful, even offering to make us a latte with the machine at the front desk.
Our room was interesting. To get to our room you had to take the elevator down from the lobby. So, technically though the lobby is at ground level it is called 'Floor 3' and to get to our room you had to go to 'Floor 1'. Interestingly, when you get to Level 1 the elevator announces that you have reached the sub-basement. Not exactly what you want to hear when arriving at your luxury accommodation. When we got to our room (there are only three rooms in the 'sub-basement') it said "102 - SAVER". Odd that your door announces to you (and everyone else) that have booked the SAVER room. To be honest I felt like were staying in some converted maids quarters or storage room. Perhaps due to renting the 'saver' room or getting a special deal our room did not come with any of the 'welcome package' you might read about at Blue Rainbow, which is fine and understandable.
So, the room? The room was lovely. Though it was a small studio apartment it was bigger than the average hotel room with a bathroom separated from the main area by a door. It had a nice kitchenette that would be very useful if you planned on cooking your own food or buying items at the grocer. Although the hotel is on the Queens St. Gardens and the booking indicated it would have a 'garden-view', the view out our sub-basement windows were actually just to a backyard grass area. I imagine the floors higher up had a Queens St. Garden view.
Overall, the experience was enjoyable and the room was nice, but there were just a few things that nagged at me. Every time the elevator said 'sub-basement' and I saw the 'SAVER' sign on the door I thought about how easy it would be to remove those to make the guest feel more comfortable. While the staff was lovely and the hotel decor is very nice I got the feeling that the target customers were not those staying in the sub-basement. read more