So I visit South Beach quite often, and most of that is driven by the fact that there are so many cool hotels to explore and stay at. Yes, the beaches are nice, the scenery isn’t too shabby, and the food and entertainment scene really are about as close to Ibiza as you can get without hopping over the Atlantic, but I really have to give it up to the choices of hotels in Miami Beach.
The W Hotel there is no exception, and it is probably one of my favorite W’s that i’ve visited. There’s two reasons for that – the room selections, and the incredible pool area.
Lets start with the lobby – it’s a marble affair with plenty of seating areas and one of my favorite restaurants – Mr. Chow’s. The ceilings are magnificently tall, and there is a definite air of modern opulence that you feel the minute you walk in.
However, lets get to the bread and butter – the rooms. It’s no secret that i’m usually a bigger fan of hotels that have a uniqueness to them. This can often be tough to find in chain hotels, but the W manages to do this quite often even while still instilling a “W-ness” to a property. At the South Beach location, you get a choice of over a dozen types of room categories. The result is some really cool floorplans including ones with staircases that lead to rooftop jacuzzis, and other rooms with their own gardens or multiple balconies. They do all possess the same styling, however, which is not a bad thing because the white wood and gloss black furniture gives a futuristic look to the hotel keeping in line with the Asian-mod-deco look of the entire place.
The other favorite feature of mine is the enormous pool and the surrounding pool deck area. There seems to always never be enough space to lounge around at most South Beach hotels, but this has never been a problem for me at the W. If you want a cabana, they’ve got plenty of those, and if you just want a chair, well they have plenty of those as well. The lush greenery, the dining tables spread amongst the palm tree forest, these are all calming and relaxing features that make this one of my favorite pools in South Beach.
PROS:
- Pool area is one of the best in a South Beach hotel
- Rooms are spectacular, great views and incredible floorplans
CONS:
- Often incredibly expensive, you do get what you pay for, however
SECRETS:
- If you are an SPG member, the combo points + cash works really well at this property for securing great deals
THINGS TO DO IN THE AREA:
- Check out my other South Beach articles to read more about this! I’ve covered it extensively in my review of the SOHO House: South Beach
