St. Ermin’s Hotel London Review: The Ultimate Marriott Base for Families?
A review of St. Ermin's Hotel London, including the charming old-world feel, strong family-friendly location, suite booking with points and cash, and the one frustrating room-switch issue during our stay.
Booking and room feel
This was our second stay at St. Ermin’s, which says something. The first time was enough to make us want to come back; the second confirmed it. We booked a suite with a combination of Marriott Bonvoy points and cash — the points stretch further here than at a comparable modern Central London hotel because the cash rate can get quite high.
The hotel’s history adds something that newer properties simply cannot manufacture. It was used as a base for espionage during both World Wars, and that layering comes through in the architecture and feel of the building without being played up in a tacky way. The lobby is genuinely striking, and the Christmas decorations during our December stay made it feel especially atmospheric.
Location and access
St. Ermin’s sits between St. James’s Park and Victoria, which is a genuinely useful location for families doing London in December. We walked to Buckingham Palace, the Guards Museum, Westminster, and the South Bank over the course of the stay without needing the Tube for most of those trips.
St. James’s Park station is around the corner for anything further afield. For families who want to cover a lot of ground without constantly managing transit, the location is one of the hotel’s strongest selling points.
What worked and what did not
What worked best was the atmosphere and the staff. The hotel has an old-world feel — slightly worn around the edges in places, but in a way that feels earned rather than neglected. It is the kind of place where the character of the building does more work than the thread count. For a family trip to London in December, that combination of history and central location is hard to beat at the points rate we paid.
What did not work was the room switch after a bathroom flood during our stay. Losing a Harry Potter wand during the move was genuinely upsetting for our kid, and even though the hotel gave us a partial refund, the incident cost us an hour of the evening and left a mark. The partial refund was the right gesture, but it is worth knowing the hotel’s response when things go wrong is good, not perfect.
The onsite restaurant felt like the weakest element — serviceable but not memorable, and London has too many good restaurants nearby to default to it. The afternoon tea was decent and worth considering as a standalone.
