St Paul’s Hotel

St Paul’s is housed in a former Victorian-era school that was designed by Alfred Waterhouse (who also designed the Natural History Museum). The building dates from 1884 and it has a fascinating history (Churchill, Eisenhower and Montgomery planned the D-Day landings here in 1944).

The hotel has 35 air-conditioned guest rooms, which all have comfortable beds, a work desk, a flatscreen television, a small fridge and minibar, tea and coffee making facilities and en suite bathrooms. Rooms range in size from 20m² (215 sq ft) to 24m² (258 sq ft). One of the rooms is adapted for guests with disabilities.

As it is a relatively small hotel, there are not a lot of facilities outside the rooms apart from a nice bar and restaurant and a couple of nice courtyards that are lovely spots for a drink on a sunny day.

The hotel restaurant and bar, Melody, has a European-inspired menu and an excellent whisky selection.

Free Wi-Fi wireless internet access is available throughout the hotel.

The hotel is on Hammersmith Road, around midway between the Olympia Exhibition Centre and the centre of Hammersmith and there are plenty of places to eat and drink within easy walking distance from here. It is ideally located for people visiting London to attend an event at Olympia, which is only a five-minute walk away. It is also close to High Street Kensington and the Design Museum.

Barons Court and Hammersmith tube stations are both less than a 10-minute walk from the hotel, as is Kensington (Olympia) Overground station. The closest of these stations is Barons Court but most people staying here walk the extra minute to Hammersmith as this station has more trains and there are more places of interest in the area surrounding the station.

Hammersmith is served by the Circle, District, Hammersmith & City and Piccadilly lines. The station is in zone two and there are trains every few minutes into central London. From here it is 16 minutes by tube to Piccadilly Circus and only eight minutes to South Kensington.

The Piccadilly line also goes to Heathrow Airport making this hotel a good option if you’re flying in or out of Heathrow. It takes just over 30 minutes to get out to Heathrow by tube and the late-night bus route N9 can take you to the airport in around 45 minutes.

Note that Hammersmith station is split into two parts: one part is served by the Circle and the Hammersmith & City lines and the other has the District and Piccadilly lines. Both parts of the station are only a one-minute walk apart but you have to exit one part and then cross the road before entering the other part of the station.

Many people staying here catch the bus from the stop on Hammersmith Road outside the hotel. Buses stop here every few minutes and provide a more scenic alternative to the tube with most services stopping en route on High Street Kensington. Bus route nine is the most useful route into Central London. This is one of London’s most scenic bus routes and it runs to Aldwych via High Street Kensington, Knightsbridge, Piccadilly Circus and Trafalgar Square.