The comments I heard the most about this place was that it seems like it doesn't belong where it is. And that's true. It's like it was destined for somewhere else and somehow dropped from the sky and landed on Winifred's main street.
Winifred MT is at the end of an already desolate road in the middle of nowhere. The census said it was home to 200 people...but I felt as if only 50 maybe lived there. It was so strange, because the same staff that worked the front desk also worked in the bar and were also maids and also cooked at the steakhouse and worked at the local cafe across the street. I'm guessing you can't find many qualified employees to work at a fancy hotel in a town of so few people in such a rural location. But those employees really did their best!
They were mostly helpful - my friend and I really were curious about the other themed rooms we hadn't seen and the employees happily showed us all of them and had to take time out of cleaning the rooms to do it. It was very kind.
However, there were some major issues. First of all the gal who came to the desk told us that they'd been having trouble with the key cards and that other guests may ask to borrow ours we were confused. But it was true - all keys worked on every room lock. Thank god the other guests seemed to be honest people like we are because none of our things appeared to be tempered with or taken. But I'm sorry...anyone with a key card could have just walked right into our room! That's not ok especially at a hotel that is expensive and fancy.
Also, when we needed some assistance on certain things, no matter the time of day, no one seemed to be around. And when we called the desk to ask about wifi (there is no cell service in Winifred and my friend and I wanted to check in at home - the hotel phone lines to dial out weren't working either) they said it would be up the next day...there was never any wifi. The entire weekend. I'm sorry but you just can not run a modern, expensive hotel with zero wifi. It may not be a priority or even an understood priority by the staff in Winifred but to those of us who come to stay there I can assure them it really is. Especially because there is no cell service there.
They also had 500 dollar fines for various offenses, one of which was bringing your dog. As an animal lover who travels with my dogs (most of the time, not on this occasion) I feel it's very important to be pet friendly, especially in this day in age when many people feel as I do. I realize there could be some irresponsible pet owners, but I can say that I don't personally know any. And that my dogs are always well behaved and clean when we travel with them. I would encourage this hotel to become pet friendly and they'd probably get more guests.
On to our room - we stayed in the Paris suite. It was very pretty (loved the light fixture) and well put together aside from some ceiling tiles that had water stains. The remote controlled fire place never did work for us no matter how hard we tried. But the room and bathroom were quite clean. Aside from maybe one stray hair and a stain in the shower the place was really spotless. I was impressed. They also had soft water while we were there which added to the luxury feel of the very nice shower. Although the only outlet in the bathroom never worked for us so we had to do our hair standing awkwardly by a mirror in the bedroom.
We also got to see the biggest, best, suite in the place - the Grecian suite. It was so fancy that it made the entire place seem more bizarre because how does a place like that exist in a tiny town!? There was a full size beautiful kitchen. Huge windows overlooking main. A fireplace and a couch. Two life size Grecian statues, a king size bed, a huge bathroom with walk in shower, and let's not forget that right in the middle of it all (with the statues on either side) was the hot tub. It was absolutely giant. The biggest, fanciest hot tub I have ever seen in my life.
The other suites I saw were more like the Paris suite - newly decorated, clean (or being cleaned), with interesting international themes. A few even had "views" out the windows in the form of giant photos being put onto the building next door so it looked like you were overlooking the Golden Gate Bridge etc. A little cheesy but nice. And very fun to look at. And overall the decor was really modern and very very well put together. Whoever the designer of this place was - they did a good job.
In the end, I feel like the issues they had shouldn't have existed, especially because there was a wedding in town that weekend - wouldn't you make sure everything was ok when you had a booked weekend? But you have to rethink your standards in a small isolated town so I think that this place is worth four stars :) read more