Richmond Hotel Rating: 3.0 Pearls

South Beach, Miami, Florida

Well-staffed and very helpful, the hotel impressed me with its overall service. I never expected over-the-top, doting attention, but they had a porter grab my bags (at least to the front desk) and I was happy with their willingness to get me in (and out) in a hurry.

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At 18th and Collins Avenue, the quiet little beachside Richmond is beside some of the biggest, swankiest party hotels in South Beach, such as the Delano, the Sagamore, the Raleigh, the National, and Shore Club.

Near some of our favorite restaurants and shops on Lincoln Road (about three blocks away), the Richmond is ideally located.

The Standard Room

My room, tragically, was where I had to pull the plug on the Richmond. Though they do their best to disguise the cheap, outdated furnishings under the Art Deco/retro nametag, there were some glaring problems.

Notably, the king beds (in both rooms I viewed) were two curbside-grade twins, shoved into a large wooden frame. The height difference between the two mattresses was noticeable the minute I entered the room (note in the photo how lopsided the bed looks). This does, however, authenticate the 1950s motif, harking back to a time when "pushing the beds together" was more than a euphemism.

Aside from the bed, the room was basic. However, it appears to have swapped retro-style tips with the Raleigh hotel, a low-key, vintage-furnished resort popular among celebrities.

The pool

The large, clean pool, half-moon hot tub and grassy yard far surpass all the hotels in the Richmond's price range; they even beat hotels that cost twice as much.

The fitness room was small and a bit warm and stifling, but tolerably clean and functional.

The only major feature flaw was the Veranda Café, which was nothing more than a guy wearing an apron and a hairnet, flipping burgers from a greasy room. (I had some grade-school lunchroom flashbacks.) On the counter beside the café's Splenda and salt shakers, I saw a line of warm bottles of Seagram's 7 and Absolute Mandarin. I took this to be the bar.

I forgave the hotel's musty, stained furniture (cloaked in white slipcovers, as if no one would notice the smell), the crusted stains on the carpet, the Frisbee-size splatters beside the headboard, and the stale, attic-y smell of the rooms. With a love for the underdog, I really wanted to like this mom-and-pop-run South Beach resort. I've stayed at some less-than-ideal places for the sake of hotel reporting (just check out the reviews of the Savoy or Penguin hotels), but once I spotted a cockroach strolling through the sheets, I gave up on the Richmond and checked out.