Praia Art Resort, an SLH Hotel

Extremely pleased from beginning to end |The place is isolated but beautiful and the sea is prestine. Even before arriving Lucha was extremely helpful sending us a taxi to collect us as we were in the wrong train station.|The service was amazing from everyone unfortunately I won’t be able to name everybody as it is hard to remember all their names but for instance Patricia, Andrea, and Alessandro made our meal times very pleasant and the chef Antonio made delicious food. The sommelier Giani Door always gave us good advice with a constant smile. And I forgot to ask the name of a very young waitress that every evening did a brilliant job always predicting what we needed and being extremely kind . |In the beach area Fabio and Fabrizio are two names I remember for their extreme kindness and good humour. |Last but not least Constanzar Lido saved me by being extremely patient and helpful by booking our trains and taxis back as well as printing our boarding passes …..|Also important to mention, the room was very clean and comfortable…. thank you to all the team for an outstanding stay |I cannot wait to go back

We stayed at this beautiful resort for five days in July. We loved the architecture and style of the resort. If you appreciate something special, this is the place for you. We were particularly impressed by the restaurant right by the sea with its excellent Italian cuisine. The whole team is extremely friendly and very helpful. We had 5 happy days.

Very enjoyable stay! The hotel is clean and peaceful. The staff are professional and attentive. The beach feels like a swimming pool, with large comfortable mattresses. A big thank you to Adil at the reception, who helped us with our room change and answered all our questions with great kindness and professionalism. Also, a special mention to the gentleman in charge of the beach facilities — thank you!

Fantastic experience that was recommended to us by Elena during our visit to Venice. The secluded beach was serene and the staff friendly and accommodating. There is a Michelin rated restaurant on the premises. No need to go anywhere else. We stayed, relaxed and were pampered by the staff.

Rooms were nice however we often found a sewage smell when coming back in the evening, there was also very little lighting in the bathroom. The service was excellent apart from one receptionist who categorically and impolitely refused to help. The rest of the staff was lovely especially the waiters.

Praia was absolutely perfect, the rooms are incredible, the food is the best we have had in Calabria. So much care and attention has gone into every detail of the resort. It is impossible to capture the beauty and essence of Praia from the photos online. You have to just trust that it was unbelievable. The service is next level, it was so relaxing and just wonderful. If you are looking for a place to shut down and relax and eat and drink good, then Praia is it. Can’t wait to come back!

Beautiful & pretty Hotel, with amazing rooms set in a “Albergo diffuso" style, modern concrete, with private gardens/ yards some included outside pools or baths/hot tubs. Lovely touches like towels for beach, allocated beach loungers/parasol with room number, fantastic beach & pool area and good food and very happy, helpful staff. Negatives- for a 5 star extra touches like a rug and two chairs & maybe a coffee table in room as a lot of space with just concrete floor and one chair. No coffee or milk in room only tea, bed was lop sided and uncomfortable, blind was broken. Seemed under staffed by pool/dinning area waited an hour for food one night. Staff seem to miss a trick by you having to get their attention to order a drink by pool/sea areas, they don't ask you. Only having one restaurant to order from was exhausted after a couple of days. Breakfast was a very slow process as again under staffed, have to queue up to be served and then they charge you extra for things on menu like bacon/pancakes! Area has nothing to offer and can only go anywhere by car. Taxi was very expensive, even just to go 15 minutes to La Castella-Also not enough organised trips, difficult to find where to go, even with extensive research. Again missing a trick here as I would have booked a few tours if it was organised and simple

We stayed at Praia this past week as travelers from the US. There are not many (if any) travelers from the US visiting this property, which makes it feel more authentic to the area but more difficult to navigate if you’re not comfortable with using translation apps. Very minimal English is spoken at the resort - which is okay with us, but could be intimidating to some. ||Our room - 301 - was amazing. The set up is perfect for a couple. Gorgeous, private yard with a pool and another gorgeous sitting area in the back (that we didn’t even use!). The unit has 2 full bathrooms, the bed is very comfortable and the closet has amazing space to open your bag and unpack. ||On the downside, the room does feel very dark and there is minimal lighting especially in the bathrooms. The lights don’t feel well placed, especially with no lighting in the shower at all. ||Towels were minimally stocked - only 1 per person. And no towels were given at all for the pool. We had to steal them from the beach every day. This just feels sloppy. If the unit has a pool, towels should be stocked and refreshed. ||This trend continued at the resort pool. There were no towels at all at the resort pool. Additionally, the pool is not set up well. There are only 4 (massively uncomfortable) pool loungers. The rest of the pool is set up with dining tables. Given there is no restaurant or service at the pool, other than breakfast, we did not get this. It made using the resort pool awkward and annoying. ||One thing we absolutely loved is that you get a lounge bed assigned to your room at the beach. There is no fighting over space and everyone has their own bed. It’s great. We’ve never seen this at a hotel and loved this feature. ||The food and service is the reason we are giving this hotel such a low rating. ||The hotel is isolated from town. Nothing is walkable except a few small stores in the neighborhood. There is no hotel shuttle at all, which we strongly feel should be an option to get into La Castella and the neighboring towns. The cabs are expensive (20 euro to go 3 miles into town!). La Castella is an adorable town with many restaurants and a gorgeous castle. The locals were so friendly - shout out to our fave restaurants Tippico & Piccante and Donna Carmela. Amazing food and the locals were so friendly! ||The surrounding neighborhood is like a family resort. It feels run down and isn’t very well cared for. There are really no sidewalks and walking around is difficult with speeding cars and trucks blowing down the streets. We like to walk and hike around our hotel in the mornings and this resort was not set up for that at all. ||In addition to the isolation, the restaurant hours and food options are not convenient for international guests. The breakfast is open 7:30-10:30 and then nothing is available until 12:30. The restaurant that opens at 12:30 is the only restaurant on property and it is very formal with a limited menu. After it closes at 3:30, there is nothing else available until dinner which is just a larger version of the lunch menu. The food and drinks are VERY expensive. The food is good at the restaurant but there’s no way a guest could do 2 meals per day there for a stay at the hotel. They need a more casual service at the pool with pizza, panini and salads. The quality of the breakfast was pretty terrible on the kitchen menu. The selections of meats, fruits and cheeses were great but there eggs were terrible. Eggs aren’t really an Italian thing so maybe they should try making something more typical so it is better quality. ||NO ONE ever asked us if we wanted anything during our 4 day stay at the hotel. At one point, we were in the pool and the entire staff including the restaurant manager were sitting at a table at the pool. They walked by us multiple times without even asking if we’d like a drink. This is just crazy to me. There is also no beach service unless you walk up to the bar. ||The service was overall pretty bad. The staff was friendly (the gentleman at the breakfast bar and the young lady waiting tables were lovely) but it’s clear that none of them have been trained to work at a luxury resort. The manager is from Sardinia, which next to Calabria, is the worst hotel service we’ve ever had. The hotel needs a real manager from a luxury hotel in an international tourist area if they want to have return guests. They will get people like us once - but the guests will have a similar experience to us and not return. The hotel was very difficult to get to, isolated, and not set up to be a destination on its own. They need to improve the food and hours that food is available, lower the drink prices, add shuttle transportation to neighboring towns, and get some better service. This was a one and done for us. 4 days was way too long and we were very ready to move on.