Shinojima Luxury Vacations

I stay at this hotel often, perfect location in the middle of Sakai next to Oasis 21 and the Tower. The staff is very friendly, with a few members who speak very good English. The rooms are beautiful and very comfortable with an amazing view of the city. This hotel is also located in the same building that host dozens of restaurants and cafes. On the 7th floor there’s an outside garden cafe with a great view of the city as well.

No plates or cutlery in rooms

Excellent room, very spacious and great views from the tower. Very modern hotel. Only thing was it didn't have a bar so you had to leave the hotel to go for a drink. Staff were friendly and welcoming. There was an issue with parking though - we paid the fee at the hotel and then were charged again by the car park provider as none of the tickets the hotel provided to us worked (so cost over £70 for parking in the end). We were also stuck at the parking exit gate with a queue of cars behind so had no choice but to pay again. Also car park is a walk away and there isnt an easy place to stop near the hotel to unload luggage.

Beautiful hotel and the location was great.

We stayed three nights and the hotel was very nice! We are a family of four so got two rooms, which was admittedly a bit of a splurge for us. The hotel connects to Kanayama station, which was quite convenient. Hotel staff was very kind. They pointed us to a delicious ramen place a short walk away. There’s also a solid CoCo Ichiban nearby. The bell desk helped us forward our bags. In-house laundry seemed steep, but that was on me for not planning better. It was a great stay!

To get to the pool or gym requires an elevator ride, walk across the lobby, separate elevator ride and passing through another staffed room (because the pool has an extra per person fee). My teenage son was not allowed to use the gym, even with supervision. Massages are not available in the morning and require a separate fee for a proper massage room instead of the bed in your room (beds make poor massage tables in my opinion). Room had a humidifier, but it brought the room up to 80% rather than a more sensible 60%. It was not configurable as far as we could tell. So we turned it off, but the cleaning staff turned it on again. Likely due to this, the room had a distinct mildew / mold smell (relatively common in Japan). The best hotels I've stayed in here have a humidifier / dehumidifier that keeps the room between 50% and 60% which is comfortable and avoids mold. Overall, it is in a very convenient location and the room was spacious (we stayed in the family room), but the extra fees were tedious and felt unwelcoming and the room was too humid and smelled of mold. To me luxury is convenience and comfort, not a fancy lobby. This hotel had issues with both.