The Stuart

looks good from the outside, but the rooms resemble the late 50s with a bit of mid 90s make-​up. there is better places in town.

Booked here as a late booking for an emergency visit to Derby. Surprised that there wasn’t any Wifi (at least none available in the room or in the restaurant), there was an ethernet cable in the room. VERY thin walls between rooms you could hear when other rooms were coming and going.
The staff were friendly and helpful, but the place would have benefited from a bit more attention to detail half-​used shower bottles were still in the room, and it seemed to be missing the remote for the TV (and aircon unit), but it was late and I wasn’t interested enough to ask about it.
Good for early risers glass recycling was collected at about 5am from outside my window.
Glad I didn’t pay full price, but it was adequate for the late booking price I did pay.

A lot of what the previous reviewer says rings true. It’s an odd specatacle of a hotel, The Stuart. But it is well intentioned. And it’s friendly.
It’s fairly cheap, they serve half decent food for breakfast (I found anyway — perhaps not worth the £8.50 though. But the company was paying), and the bar downstairs is a decent enough place to relax with a drink and catch the football, if that’s your thing.
I’m a bit baffled by the obscure lighting in the foyer and the piped trance music. But I seemed to be able to get past this by telling myself ‘you’re in the midlands. It’s different up here’.

I lived at the Stuart for about a month during 2009 and had no issues with it apart from the pressure in the shower when I was in a room on the top floor. As long as I wasn’t on that floor I would be happy to stay there again.

The first time I ever visited the place, I thought it was a set location for mid-​budget porn films — strobe lighted counters, and just a musty smell/​décor about it. Who would ever stay here? I mocked. And a year later, for all my vices (and room availability issues) I had to stay at this damned hotel for nine whole days.
It is an awful, awful place. The lights barely work, the radiator programmed to either refrigerate the room of broil it. Actually, that’s a theme common with the shower and sinks as well. And someone’s got to explain to me why the fuck they need to have two separate taps for hot and cold. It’s a logistically retarded notion. You have one tap for freezing water, and the other one for scalding water. Separated by a good 7 – 9 inches (so they don’t really mix).
It takes on average 15 minutes for the one 90 year old to seat you for breakfast in the morning, and an additional 45 to come get your order. So no breakfast for someone who say wakes up an hour early before jumping into a taxi to get to work.
So if you have a reason to visit Derby (after you’ve asked the question why a number of times) go find another place to stay — they’ll be a holiday inn and a Hampton inn soon enough.

don’t know how they can call themselves a 4* hotel… bathroom was cold — no heating and –5 outside. Bath was so short only a child could use it. Using the loo mean’t squeezing my average build body between the wall and the sink — no good if you have more than 34″ waist I would think. Nice décor and free parking which was a +. Oh and the rooms have very thin doors — my mate heard my text arriving from the other end of the corridor and we were both in our rooms!