I've finally settled on a hotel in Rome for our trip in February,(thanks Rex, Julia and Stu T.) In Rome, I was afraid my choices were not good enough. In Florence, I have the opposite problem...they are too good! I've eliminated Villa Medici and Villa la Vedetta because my final choices seem to be in a better location. Help me decide between:

Hotel Degli Orafi
Hotel Pierre
Hotel Plaza Lucchesi.

They all have similar ratings here and on Trip Advisor and Venere. At least on a map, Degli Orafi seems to be the best located, but the other two seem to have nicer facilities. Does anyone here have some insights to help me make up my mind? Thanks!

I hate to add one more to your list- I know, Florence has some really great hotels- but I would feel badly if I did not give you one that I found terrific... It's called the Hotel Davanzati- great location, more than helpful staff, spotlessly clean, and overall one of the best places I have ever stayed. Again, I'm sorry- I know how hard it is to whittle down a list. I don't know of the others you mentioned. Above all, have a great trip!

ttt

have you looked at the comments on www.tripadvisor.com?

nut - she says in her questions that they all are rated the same on Trip Advisor.

My apologies for scanning the message too quickly..

I did some searching on past posts about the hotels and found many people mentioning that they were staying at the degli orafi but none seem to come back and post about it. The only real mention was a fairly recent one about the Plaza Lucchesi which was:
"While inside the museum, our luggage was taken to our hotel, Plaza Hotel Lucchesi so that it would be in our rooms when we arrived. This hotel is located in the vicinity of Santa Croce and is located along the Arno River. Rooms here seemed much brighter than the previous hotel, with hard wood floors, glass chandeliers, mirrored wardrobe doors. My room as well as my parent’s looked out on the Arno River, which was nice to see."

My suggestion is that you look at the website, the photos provided and look at where they're located. If everything seems equal, just pick one based on what you can tell by the images provided.

Plaza Lucchesi (pronounced Luke-hazy) is close to Santa Croce, along the Arno. The rooms are small, but nicely decorated. The breakfast buffet is good, but not lavish.

This hotel can be very noisy, as the walls are like tissue paper. Pray you do not sleep in a room adjacent to sex addicts, for your daughter's sake.

Can you afford the Savoy? It is so much nicer.

Kevin Mitford

ttt