The Chesterfield Hotel Palm Beach

This review is for afternoon tea I did yesterday. We made reservations online but we did request to sit in the library. The library was wonderful, it was so peaceful and quiet in there. Such a great location for afternoon tea. The tea is a traditional English afternoon tea so keep that in mind. Our server was Trilanda and she was awesome. Very sweet and attentive. All the food was great except I'd get rid of that ham and cheese sandwich and do something different. That sandwich was gross and pretty boring. The pastries and scone were delicious. They also serve champagne for an upgrade. I highly recommend this tea for a girls day or for a treat.

When we arrived, I thought my expectations would be dashed and they certainly were. There was no busboy to helps us with our bags, which we had to carry to the lobby ourselves. While walking to the lobby, we passed the exterior of the hotel’s Leopard Lounge. I noticed immediately that the paint on the iron tables was chipped in many places. Upon entering the lobby, you are greeted by quite worn furniture which appears to be from the 80s. The piping on the upholstery of a wing chair had become detached and was just hanging. The couch and chairs were very, very worn (you know how down cushions look when they are flattened and past their prime). The area carpet was laid in a haphazard way with no straight edges and apparently no carpet pad for cushioning. We then took our bags upstairs to our room, which the concierge said was a nice room overlooking the pool, did overlook the pool but was far from nice. Where do I begin? The outdated New England “colonial” furniture had been painted white and was totally incongruous with the hip vibe of Palm Beach. The white paint was scratched and gouged in many places and the carpet stained. The whole room had a musty smell, perhaps due to the leaky air conditioner, since repaired, but with the water stain quite obvious under the unit as a result of the leak. When packing to go home, all our clothes reeked of the musty smell. Perhaps that’s why there was a mold-like film on the face of the air conditioning unit which looks like it had not been wiped down in months. The closets were spacious, but the “colonial” furniture had but four drawers, leaving little room for two occupants garments. There was a piece of leftover food or bread crumb on our carpet for the duration of our stay, leading us to conclude that the carpet hadn’t’ seen a vacuum cleaner in at least four days (the duration of our stay). Now onto the bath. First, like the room, it was tiny. I get it, the hotel was built in the 20s when times were different, but at least it could be clean. The once white stone floors were etched with urine stains and the surface wornto a dull gray from lack of sealing and maintenance. There was a wad of previous occupants hair in the corner of the toilet and tub which took two days to disappear. There was a hair from a previous occupant on the rim of the toilet. The banana leaf wallpaper on the walls leading to the pool may have been trendy in the 80s but looks terribly dated today. A similar pattern is repeated on the carpeted hallway floors which look to be of the same vintage and quite dirty. When at the pool, there is no full-time attendant to set up lounge chairs, etc. It is catch as catch can and if there is no one there you have to go to the lobby to ask for help. If you want to go to the beach, you have to walk one-half mile with chairs and umbrellas they give you at the reception desk. There is no ride offered, despite the fact that there is a four or six seat golf cart emblazoned with the Chesterfield logo on t