Malmaison Dundee

Dundee is perhaps not top of one’s list of must-see places, however, with the addition of the newly opened Malmaison Hotel (housed in an original Victorian building complete with pepperpot corner turret) at least there is now somewhere decent to stay. When the new satellite V&A museum finally opens (2017) on the potentially magnificent Firth of Tay waterfront, who knows - Dundee may become the new mini-break destination of choice! There are lots of good points about this hotel, but the overall trouble with the ‘Mal’ brand is, frankly, the decor. Their hotels tend to be dark and ‘nightclubby’ in feel, rather than light and bright, but that said, the ‘bling’ aspect kind of works in Dundee, and the framed cartoons of Ooor Willie, Dennis the Menace and The Broons are a nod to the historic home of The Beano. The hotel signage is amusing: ‘Clear Up or Clear Off’ on the door hangers, ‘Wheel my bed downstairs or bring breakfast up to my room’ on the room-service menu, ‘Get an earful’ on the cotton buds!! The bedrooms are very comfy, the bathrooms gleamingly new with nice Fig fragranced products – you can’t really complain. There is a large first floor restaurant (clubby in feel) overlooking The Tay Bridge (and currently a lot of road works) with an open kitchen at one end, a pre-dinner bar area at the other and a rather mesmerizing flames-behind-glass feature in the middle. It’s a good middle-of-the-road dinner menu. Nice breakfast. Lots of young professionals with their computers around the place. There is no lobby area to speak of which renders the hotel a little soul-less as the downstairs bar (lots of whisky brands) is really designed more for the evening. The friendly and willing staff are still on a bit of a learning curve, but service will assuredly improve as the hotel establishes itself. At present this is your best bet for an upmarket hotel in Dundee.