Stay at The Trafalgar St. James Hilton Hotel, with its rooftop bar overlooking Trafalgar Square

Photo: Craig Cross

Craig’s review… You can usually tell whether you’re going to like a hotel within the first two minutes of arriving, and it took me even less than that for the Trafalgar St. James because it’s situated on one corner of Trafalgar Square, sixty-seconds from the National Gallery and five-minutes from Big Ben. If you want a great location then you can’t get any better than that.

Bedroom at the Trafalgar Hilton

Photo: Craig Cross

The bedroom is pretty big with a separate sitting area for the desk. You also get a widescreen TV with a DVD player, minibar and safe, ironing board and iron, plus something called a shoe mitt (I haven’t got a clue what this is).

I always like to price up the minibar so you can see how expensive it is. Every hotel minibar is expensive of course, and anybody who drinks a minibar dry is a total mug because the hoteliers know there’ll always be someone sitting here at midnight watching the raindrops run down the window. That’s when £7 quid for a tiny shot of vodka seems like a good idea. It’s another £7 quid for rum and £3.75 for the Coke. Even the water costs three quid.

I’ve just noticed a tiny sign on the minibar which says “please be aware that any items moved will be charged using motion sensor technology”. Now they tell me! I’ve just been shifting the whole lot around to tell you the prices – I’ll probably get billed an extra fifty quid now. Ah well. I may as well drink the whole lot now.

Photo: Craig Cross

Hotel bar and breakfast room

They don’t have a proper restaurant in this place, only a breakfast room (which is basically the same as the downstairs bar), and the only hot meal they serve is omelette. And that’s not an exaggeration. But this is no ordinary omelette – the chef doesn’t just crack an egg into a pan and flip it over a few times. This omelette is an actual work of art.

He makes it in full view of the diners with mushrooms and peppers and meat and all the trimmings, all coloured-up like a folded pillow of gold. It was perfectly nice to eat, but where are the beans? Where are the sausages? I’d much rather they just serve up a proper English breakfast because you’re going to get bored having an omelette every day.

Rooftop bar overlooking Trafalgar Square

Photo: Craig Cross

If you come during the summer then you can try the rooftop bar that overlooks Trafalgar Square. It’s literally on the roof – if it’s raining then you’ll get wet. And you can look over at the National Gallery, Nelson’s Column and St Martin-in-the-Fields church.

Unfortunately it’s always very busy and they won’t let you take up a table for a quick coffee, you have to actually reserve a space for a sit-down meal (it’s not like a pub bar). But it’s well worth popping along just to have a peer over the ledge.

So the location = great. The room = great. The rooftop bar = great. The breakfast = not so great.

Worth a stay? ★★★Value for money? ★★★Nice rooms? ★★★Good location? ★★★

The author Craig Cross owns city-guide.london and has spent the last decade reviewing the capital’s landmarks, attractions and hotels. His guidebook London Squire is available from Amazon. This review was updated on 31st August 2023