Mandarin Oriental Conservatorium, Amsterdam

Awesome place to stay on Museumsplein.

The rooms and staff were awesome.

Locatie

Love the city, love the hotel.

The Mandarin Oriental Conservatorium is in an excellent location literally across the street from the Van Gogh museum and a very short walk to the Rijkmuseum. Very convenient. We loved the corridors in the hotel–they gave a stylish, oldy-worldy feel. Our room was on two levels with one bathroom upstairs and another downstairs. Make sure to book a room with an upstairs bathroom unless you can cope with navigating downstairs in the middle of the night. The staff were all super-friendly and efficient. The concierge gave excellent restaurant recommendations if you want to eat in the local area. The pool and gym were both excellent and the sauna was nice and hot. Great. Overall, we highly recommend the Mandarin Oriental but be aware that you will pay about 33% tax on your hotel stay (13% city tax, 21% VAT).

Excellent

Our first stay at Mandarin Oriental Conservatorium Amsterdam and it was excellent. The property has the perfect contrast of old and modern architecture with a large roomy atrium which encompasses the reception, the lounge / restaurant and Ottolenghi restaurant. Whilst in there you get the feeling as if you are eating outside but you are seated in comfort inside. Additionally the is another superb restaurant , Taiko, on the next floor. On the lower ground is a well set up gym and a fine spa. We had a very spacious duplex room facing the atrium, well appointed , comfy bed , two bathrooms and with plenty of storage. The staff were brilliant , helpful, efficient and friendly.

Gorgeous Hotel in a Great Area

We arrived very early after a two week cruise. The hotel common spaces are stunningly beautiful. The combination of the classic architecture with the modern of the MO is very pleasing. Check in was smooth. We were informed that we received an upgrade because we booked through Amex’s Fine Hotel (more on that later). We also received free breakfast and a €85 credit to use. Unfortunately, we had an early flight and breakfast doesn’t start until 7 am. Also, there are no breakfast items on the all-day room service menu. So, we couldn’t use the breakfast or credit. I wish they had something to offer those with early departures. Our room wasn’t ready yet, which was understandable since we were early and we had museum tickets anyway. Once we arrived back we were shown to our room by the receptionist. We booked a Deluxe room because after comparing the rooms online, we didn’t want a loft with the bathroom downstairs. Our upgrade was to a Junior Suite Loft. I almost said something when we shown the room, but we were told there was a second bathroom upstairs so we went with it. The second bathroom door made a terrible squeak when it opened. It was taken care of before we returned from dinner which was nice. The room looks great, but the functionality didn’t work for us. The living room space was tiny. We weren’t going to haul our luggage upstairs and the proper bathroom was downstairs. I think I hit my head on the extra low drum light over the desk 3 or 4 times. Overall, we should have stayed with our original choice of room. Having said that, I believe the hotel is top notch and wouldn’t hesitate to try it again with more time to enjoy the facilities.

Stain on the brand

This hotel is an abomination and a stain on the Mandarin Oriental brand. Walked in for check-in at 20:00 and no one at the desk, had to wait a couple minutes, annoying after a long day of travel. At check-in, didn’t give me Amex benefits letter, didn’t acknowledge or confirm the benefits orally either. Got a Deluxe room, which staff claimed had been upgraded to a Premier Deluxe. I can’t seem to tell the difference between the two based on the website - I suspect it’s a fake category distinction to fulfill “upgrades” for Amex benefits. On entering room, saw room didn’t have two sinks or a bathtub next to a window as shown on the website. Entire reason for booking this category room was the two sinks. I would never have paid the money for it otherwise. Called about room, staff said only a couple rooms in that category have two sinks and a window bathtub and none available. Should be illegal to show pictures of a beautiful room on the website with unique benefits and then not give those rooms to guests who paid for them - it’s fraud, plain and simple - no different than sneakily pickpocketing cash out of my wallet. And frankly, it’s stupid not to give us one of those good rooms anyway - we are Mandarin Silk members staying for 4 nights - why would they not block us one of the nice rooms instead of giving them all to one-night weekenders? Just dumb customer service, aside from the fraud. As I’m on the phone with front desk about the room, my wife discovers the previous customer’s belongings in the dresser - filled with clothes and expensive goods from a luxury store. Clearly the staff doesn’t clean thoroughly between customers. Manager moved us to a “junior suite” to apologize, but this room is even worse than previous. Bathroom is shockingly smaller and still only one sink. Has an annoying staircase to bed area which is dangerous and easy to trip - the final step at the bottom is different from all the other colored steps and has the same textured pattern as the wood floor, making it easy to miss or accidentally stub your toe, which happened to me multiple times. Most annoying is the replacement room they gave us has a streetcar track outside which rumbles every couple minutes like an earthquake or thunder. Ordered room service for dinner first night and manager called to say it would be free as an apology. I kid you not, the penne pasta arrived cold and is the worst pasta I have ever eaten. You couldn’t pay me to eat this awful pasta. We actually had a $100 food credit through Amex to use for subsequent nights and avoided using it for several nights since we were dreading eating the terrible room service food. On the last night we tried room service again and ordered the curry - we literally laughed when the food arrived. It was like if someone had never cooked before and googled a picture of curry - some watery curry sauce out of a box, low-quality premade chicken breast from a package at the grocery store, and the worst rice I have ever eaten. Unbelievable the gall of these people to serve this food anywhere, let alone at a Mandarin Oriental. The only reason we ordered the pasta and the curry was because this hotel doesn’t have a Chinese/Asian food section for room service, even though that is one of the primary selling points of the Mandarin Oriental brand. It’s extremely disappointing that Mandarin puts their name on the property and doesn’t have the expected quality and offerings of the brand. They actually have two other restaurants in the hotel, including a Japanese one, but they won’t let you order from those restaurants for room service for some reason. We stayed at the Mandarin Oriental Munich last week and you could order from their Japanese restaurant Matsuhisa in addition to the ordinary room service menu. Bizarre issue with our room service is the room only has a coffee table that is literally six inches from the floor. And the room service came on a tray both times, so we had to awkwardly sit on the floor to eat the terrible food. And annoyingly, there are these low hanging lamps around the room, and the floor plan is awful so me and my wife have both hit our head on these stupid lamps many times while staying here. I hate these awful lamps. Another bizarre issue is the toilet - to flush the toilet, you have to push these buttons that dip about half an inch into the wall, and you have to push them hard. Like it literally hurts my finger joint to push them, and my wife couldn’t press them at all with her nails. Just insane terrible functional design I’ve never seen before. Room looks run-down overall - cracked corners in shower and bathtub. Black mold visible in bathtub and corners of sink. Disgusting. Corners and areas under tables are dusty and gross, complete with toenails under the bedside table - they clearly don’t clean the rooms much at all. Directly above the pillow area of the bed is a brown splatter stain on the white ceiling, so every time you’re laying in bed you see it directly above you. Even a cursory glance while cleaning would see this disgusting splatter - it has probably been there for a year or longer. So when you’re lying in bed with your partner, relaxing after the day, you inevitably see the ceiling and it kills the mood to see the disgusting brown splatter, makes you feel like you’re staying at a Motel 6 - completely inexcusable for a Mandarin Oriental. This is the type of hotel you’re afraid to be barefoot, which I could have never imagined I’d say about a Mandarin Oriental. Breakfast is in the lobby in a restaurant that doesn’t feel “Mandarin” at all - it’s exactly the same breakfast venue as before Mandarin acquired this hotel. There aren’t enough staff and service is slow. You’ll be taken to a seat and no one ever comes to take your drink order, the typical signs of a poorly organized breakfast that indicate a poorly run hotel. Every morning our server would take our order without writing it down and there would be mistakes and missing items - the first morning she brought my wife the wrong tea - the second morning she brought us the wrong juice instead of orange juice - just write it down - there’s nothing cool about doing your job poorly. Items don’t get restocked on the buffet so there are often only a couple remaining mushed berries. And the selection would feel limited at even a mid-tier hotel. You can only order one item from the menu, so if you get eggs, you can’t also try the French toast - any other Mandarin will let you try whatever you want, feels stingy and poor. There are no silverware holders so you have to just put your old worn out fork and knife on the plain table which looks like it has never been wiped. Doesn’t feel like a high-quality luxurious Mandarin Oriental breakfast at all. On our last morning, we got to breakfast at 9am and it wasn’t crowded at all, ordered 2 glasses of orange juice, but our waiter only brought one glass and explained that they had run out of orange juice - oh we can just wait a few minutes for them to make some more, we said - but they may not make any more orange juice today, she replied. And that was that. Embarrassing incompetence and laziness across the hotel. Our second night, the old antiquated reading light next to the bed started randomly flickering and woke me and my wife up. There’s a small button on it but the connection seemed to have been broken and the light kept flickering. It woke us up a few more times over the course of the night. So utterly infuriating and stupid. You can use WhatsApp to request things from the front desk, which is ordinary now for Mandarin Oriental, but often they don’t reply for a while. Sometimes it would be 45 minutes before I received a reply. At checkout, they asked me if I wanted to take a look at the bill and I said yes, only to discover they hadn’t applied the Amex food benefit. That took time for them to fix, and if I hadn’t checked, I’ve had been overcharged for that horrible room service food. Incompetence and laziness from the first moment I entered the hotel until the last. I truly hate this hotel and we will never return. Mandarin Oriental should try to get their money back for purchasing this failure of a hotel - total disaster that will damage their brand. We stayed at the Mandarin Oriental Munich last week and it was amazing - so sad Amsterdam is so awful by comparison. They should demolish this dump and start over.

Having wanted to try a Mandarin Oriental for some time, I wont be rushing back.

We were upgraded on arrival to room number 601. the room was good, the bed and pillows passable. Having stayed at the Dorchester and Savoy in London many times, I often wondered how the Mandarin Oriental would compare. Sadly it did not come near. It has put me off trying the hotel in London. I must say all members of staff were super friendly and helpful.