Taormina is a beautiful town steeped in culture and history, however the Splendid Hotel seems to miss all of that character and in some ways feels a little soulless. It has clearly been refurbished recently and has a modern feel, however when you look a little closer you see that most things are finished poorly - gaps around fixtures / fittings, warped floors, a shower which doesn’t really close properly (leading to a pretty significant leak) - but above all else, the hotel lacks any of the beauty of the town in which it is situated and is instead a sterile white cookie-cutter example of a hotel that could fit in literally anywhere in the world.
For some people that might actually be a positive, however Italy has so much to offer and so many hotels and B&Bs achieve the perfect balance of character and modernity.
We were encouraged to book a table in the rooftop restaurant as it is frequently full however when we arrived we were only the second couple. The food was ok, but not great value for money. The pool-side bar is also on the expensive side and they didn’t even have the facilities to make a real cappuccino. Additionally, the pool itself isn’t exactly big enough to host the significant number of guests the hotel can accomodate.
The breakfast buffet was actually a redeeming quality, ample selection both early and later in the morning, even if having a room directly next to the dining room meant we were woken up at 6:30am by the noise of preparations.