The Dominican

Location: This hotel is highly praised for its central location, with many users noting its proximity to major attractions like Grand Place, shopping areas, and public transport hubs. The environment is described as calm despite being in the city center.(based on 19 reviews)

⸻ The worst hotel experience I have ever had We stayed at The Dominican Brussels for 3 nights, after carefully checking ratings and reviews. Unfortunately, it turned out to be the worst hotel experience we have ever had. When we first entered the room, the bathtub was not properly cleaned and the complimentary snacks had already been opened. We overlooked this, but the real problem started the next morning. Despite the “Do Not Disturb” sign on our door, someone tried to open it and enter our room. Only after I shouted loudly did the person apologize and quickly run away down the corridor. When I reported this to the reception, they admitted they had mistakenly assigned our room to another guest. They apologized, but honestly, what difference did it make? For the rest of our stay, we felt unsafe, worried that someone could open our door at any time, with no respect for our privacy. The same night, around 3:00 AM, a man claiming to be hotel security banged aggressively on our door, causing panic. He didn’t speak English, and with hand gestures, he tried to tell us there had been a noise complaint from the neighboring room — even though there was no noise at all. Instead of simply calling our room, he chose to disturb us in the middle of the night, while earlier he had failed to prevent another guest from trying to enter our room. This was an unacceptable breach of safety and privacy. As frequent travelers who have stayed at many hotels over the years, we have never experienced anything worse.

Check-in is 3pm and we arrived at 3pm but the room was only ready at almost 4pm. The story was that it was cleaned already but "awaiting inspection". We were handed 2 bar coupons with a blithe apology in rapid fire French for our 50 min wait. The vacuuming in the room left much to be desired. When we got into the room on the 1st day, there was a pistachio at the side of the bed. My sister's dust allergy was triggered throughout our 4 day stay. When we opted for housekeeping on the 3rd of the 4 days we stayed, the same pistachio remained there after the cleaning staff were done. Towels and bed linens were refreshed but the coffee/tea and bathroom amenities were not. If you choose the Deluxe twin room like we did, please note that the room is 24 metre square and there is only room to open up one medium sized suitcase on the ground. Our other suitcase had to be accessed via the wardrobe which was spacious enough to keep the 2nd suitcase in. Location wise, it's ideal and a stone's throw from Grand Place - the historic city centre, and many shops and good brasseries. It's a 10 min uphill walk from the hotel to the nearest train station called Brussel Centraal / Bruxelles-Midi which will bring you straight to the Brussels Airport in 17 min on the direct train (1st class carriage €12.10). The buffet breakfast is plentiful and of good quality (with eggs cooked to order) in a nice space with a courtyard view crewed by pleasant staff fluent in English. The bar has a relaxing ambience with an outdoor view and affordable drinks. My guide is always how much the increasingly rare digestif liqueur Chartreuse Verte costs. It was €14 per pour. Note : You get a free coupon for a soft drink/coffee/beer/wine if you pass up on room cleaning. If you have a short stay, you should as there wasn't much cleaning done.