Hotel International au Lac - Lugano

We often stay in hotels and don't mind paying a lot for a room however, I then expect to get what I pay for. The breakfast buffet was dismal, the bread was so stale on the Saturday we couldn't eat it. It was mariginally better on the Sunday but when food ran out at the buffet, it took a long time to replenish, we had to go and get a waiter to ask for drinks and it was generally nothing special. Our bathroom didn't have a glass for our tothbrusshes, the bath was so filthy with ingrained dirt that I could barely bring myself to step in it. As we left the girl asked me were we happy with our stay and I said no and she simply said "oh!" I did complete a survey with my issues on it and when I cam back later as I was unable to get out of the hotel car park I finally asked to speak to the manager who was rude and spoke over the top of me the whole time. Despite the wonderful location, I would never go back there.

Hotel is a blast from the past - old and gentrified. Room was quite sparse, but did the job adequately. Window looked out over the lake. Restaurant was a bit lacking in atmosphere, but the food was excellent and fantastic value for Lugano.

Très bonne situation. Au bord du lac avec parking intérieur. Bonne acceuil!

A very nice hotel with an early 20th century ambiance. But expensive.

This is a total rip-off for the price paid: 1) Fittings in the room are unbelievably archaic -- absolutely no sense of modernity at all. Bathroom fittings are really old, flimsy e.g the toilet seat looks like it could come off anytime; they don't even provide a electric kettle for boiling water; not even a small complimetary bottled water. For > CHF200/night, one expects a much more decently furbished room; 2) While I understand that they are attempting to maintain the overall age of the building, they have for convenience chosen to overlook some of the more important aspects: e.g. the door lock and keys look like they are indeed 100 years old -- they absolutely do not give a sense of security at all because the key can be easily duplicated by anyone! 3) The bad furnishing is matched by the absolutely disgraceful level of hotel service: a) at 7:00 pm, without any knocking on the door, the cleaner lady just unlocked & opened the door while my wife & I were inside the room! Then, some 30 mins later, another man in hotel uniform, did exactly the same thing -- again without knocking on the door. I have never in my life experienced such rude, incompetent hotel service -- one can imagine the embarrassment if we were not decent at those moments. 4) At about 8:00 pm that same night, I paid the hotel bill because we were leaving very early the next morning. But as though the hotel was absolutely determined to show off its downright incompetence, the concierge even had the audacity to ring my room at about 11:00 pm that night to wake me up & ask for payment yet again! I defintely would not recommend a stay here.

Excelent location, old style spacius rooms, free wifi in the room, garage. We enjoyed our stay very much. We were using the hotel only for night stay, so didn't tested other facilities like the pool.

A wonderful, beautiful old style hotel. Scenic location, wonderful furnishings, hotel history photos and memmorablia displays. Comfortable common area and bar, well kept private outdoor terraces. Delightful waiters in the restaurant, generous breakfast, helpful desk staff. Very comfortable and relaxing. Outdoor pool on the premises.

Faded beauty hotel in a great location. Good value, basic hotel in a great location in Lugano. It's not a modern hotel but OK.

Hotel has a good site, set back from the busy promenade road, close to shops and walking distance from the train station. Presently a little noisy from renovation of church next door. Bedrooms look newly done up. Bathroom very pleasant with heated towel rails and bidet. Ambience of hotel, old world charm. Good value for money.

To hold high class service

This is a 100 year old hotel in the Grande style of long ago... but it has been redone, it's modern, and the location is steps from the lake and at the end of the main shopping street. It has one of those old fashioned libraries or lounges and there is a bar with free internet station inside. Breakfast was ample and good.

The room was lovely, a great view on to the lake and lovely balcony. The room was clean and reception staff and cleaning staff were excellent. We recieved some poor service and a rather bad attitude from one member of the bar staff and one of the breakfast staff, however this did not spoil our stay we just chose not to use the bar any more. I would recommend this hotel.

Hotel is not directly at the lake but there is a plaza and a big street in between. I did not notice in the internet, that I must specify a room with air conditioning if I wanted one. Now there is a hint in the home page. The internet connection in the bar was very helpful.

There were mainly elderly people staying there but as we only stayed for 1 night, we were mostly interested in the surroudings which were fantastic!