If you are like me, once you have decided on where to go on holiday you spend hours or days of your life researching where to stay. I lost count the amount of hours spent looking for a luxury family hotel for our holiday to Chicago but I’m so glad that we chose the Swissotel Chicago, as soon as we opened the door to our room we didn’t want to check out five days later.
Designed by renowned Chicago architect Harry Weese, this distinctive all-glass hotel offers spectacular wrap-around views of the city of Chicago from Navy Pier to Millennium Park and the Swissotel Chicago is the perfect location to base yourself.
If you have never thought about visiting Chicago before then you really should add it to your bucket-list, it’s such an amazing city to visit with so much going on to keep all the family occupied.
This is our review of the Swissotel Chicago and why it’s a great option for families when visiting the city.
The hotel has 661 rooms and suites all of which have been recently renovated. We booked through British Airways Holidays and we stayed in one of the hotel suites, but unlike other hotel suites that you might have come across the ones at the Swissotel Chicago have been designed for kids.
The kids suites are enormous, so big in fact it was like having our own penthouse apartment within a five-star hotel with all the modern-day comforts close to hand. With 3 bathrooms, spacious living area, a gorgeous master bedroom and a kids themed bedroom you could actually get lost in the suite – and we often did!
The kids bedroom was so cool it must be a dream room for kids, with lots of age appropriate toys, books and games and children’s themed bedding on their double beds – even their bathroom had child friendly touches.
The fun kids theme continued into the living area where the hotel had set up skittles for us to play but Holly’s favourite was the tepee that was set up complete with complete with its own mattress and bedding.
The warm welcome continued as the hotel provided a birthday cake for Ian and welcome drinks and the girls had a bowl of hot popcorn, warm cookies and milk which was a lovely touch and much appreciated.
The look on both Chloe and Holly’s faces when they came across all the kids activities in our room was so memorable – the Swissotel really did think of everything. In fact it was a challenge to coax them to leave their room it was so child friendly so we could explore what Chicago had to offer.
The extremely comfortable beds in all of our rooms had the highest quality bedding for the perfect night’s sleep, and was just what we needed each night after busy days exploring Chicago
The girls in particular were more than happy to relax in their own room of our suite, using the free high speed wifi for their iPads or watching their favourite programmes on their super-size TV.
There were three huge TVs to choose from in our suite so there were no arguments, the girls had Disney, my husband had NFL and I could catch up on movies.
One of my favourite things about our suite on the 35th floor were the views from its numerous vantage points, and because of the unique triangular design of the hotel it ensured that we had fantastic views of the gorgeous skyline of Chicago, the Chicago River and toward Navy Pier and Lake Michigan.
One of my favourite things to do each morning was opening the curtains to see the sunrise over Lake Michigan and the magnificent skyline of the city.
The Swissotel is located on the banks of the Chicago river close to the Riverwalk and in-between the Magnificent Mile and Millennium Park – two locations that you will definitely visit when in the city.
We covered quite a large area of the city over the 6 days we were in Chicago and thought that the area where the Swissotel was located was the most family friendly. Because of its central location, there were so many amazing restaurants to choose from all within walking distance or a short UBER ride away.
Because of this we only dined at the hotel once at the Palm restaurant for breakfast which was a little disappointing, but there are so many great places nearby you are spoilt for choice – one of our favourites was Wildberry Pancakes.
Overall and is it family friendly?
If you’re looking for a luxury family escape when you’re travelling to Chicago, you certainly can’t go wrong with the Swissotel Chicago – if you can I highly recommend booking the kids suites.
Other hotels that we would recommend looking at and were on our shortlist include the Langham Chicago, Peninsula Chicago, Ritz Carlton Chicago and the Loews Chicago Hotel.