This joint Homewood Suites / Curio new hotel is one of the
closest to the airport, being located just prior to the
large 'LAX' sign at the end of W Century Blvd. The two
hotels share a common lobby space. I had checked in online
for this stay and was intrigued to hear the front-desk agent
remark that I had chosen his favourite room! And indeed, I
think it was an excellent choice: nice and private, spacious
and with a notably high ceiling. The entire property (or at
least, the Curio part of it) had an uber-stylish,
contemporary look and feel. Instead of operating the
elevators in the established manner, you had to indicate
your destination as part of the 'call' function; a car would
appear within a few seconds and no further instructions were
needed. The coolest feature of all was Hannah, a robotic
device for delivering items to rooms. (She was not yet up to
doing room service - I asked!)
External soundproofing wasn't brilliant: I could hear both
traffic noise and aircraft noise. Neither of these bothers
me, however. I tend to have a much worse reaction to 'people
noise', and there was none of that.
Lurking among all the positives, however, was one absolute
shocker: they had no
liquor licence!!! Oh, there was a very
attractive-looking bar, but it served soft drinks only. In a
very classy, full-service hotel, I assumed that my
server was joking at first and reacted accordingly, until a
sheepish expression and a slight roll of the eyes conveyed
to me that she was being completely serious. I went on to
watch numerous dropped jaws from other guests. One assumes
that this was some kind of 'opening glitch'. Once they get
it sorted - and they surely must! - this will be my
favourite LAX hotel. |