Visitation Hotel Frederick, a Tribute Portfolio Hotel

This was originally an old building that was a school house owned by a local church. Marriott did a fantastic job in remodeling the inside while maintaining the exteriors wonderful colonial style exterior. The inside has old relics from the early 1920s to the 1950s. Giving a nice aesthetic and old time quality missing from many of today's hotels. Room service was good too. But since it was a soft opening, there were a few mistakes made. First was not enough baggage carriers for luggage, another was that valet parking hired people that spoke poor English, making it difficult to understand them. Last was that the room I was in with a pullout bed. The pullout was close to a heavy coffee table, which had to be moved in order to get the bed out. Heavy coffee tables should not be next to pullout beds, or rather a table that can be moved easier. It was still a pleasant stay, and I hope that this hotel becomes the gold standard for other Frederick hotels.

The Visitation bills itself as a boutique hotel, but it has a long way to go. We arrived on a quiet Sunday afternoon and were upgraded to a deluxe king room. Upon arriving to our room, it appeared to be very nice, but we found out quickly that looks are deceiving. As others have commented, our room was freezing. Our heat was set to 64*, but even after jacking it up to 75* (which took many hours to get to that temperature), we were still shivering. The facilities person brought us a space heater, but it did not work at all. The front desk brought us two extra down duvets, but it meant we couldn’t enjoy our lovely room without shivering. To add insult to injury, the architect opted to use the cheapest single pane windows possible (over the historic original ones), so there was lots of cold air leaking into the room. Spending some time and money on caulk might help a little. So here we are freezing and decided we wanted some hot tea. This so-called boutique hotel only has coffee. Again the front desk did bring us some after hunting around to find some, but nothing decaffeinated was available. The bougie coffee station is set up underneath the TV, but laughingly, there’s no available plug behind the bureau in which to use the coffee/tea maker. We opted not to eat on premises, but had leftovers from our dinner. Again, as others mentioned, there was no refrigerator. Fortunately, the facilities person did bring us a working refrigerator. In this day and age, we’ve come to expect the bare minimum in a room, so we were miffed why there wasn’t a refrigerator, or anywhere to get ice (except at the front desk). I guarantee that no one from HHM Hotels senior leadership bothered to stay at this hotel and see whether their stay was comfortable. Ours wasn’t. If it wasn’t for the kind assistance of Monterra, we wouldn’t have even bothered to stay the night. Don’t waste your money. Frederick is a cute place to visit. This hotel is in the right location, but it certainly doesn’t provide you with the creature comforts you’d expect from a boutique hotel.

The Visitation hotel is a beautiful place to stay for a weekend of exploring Frederick. The renovation respectfully kept the beauty of the former school building and the charm of the history. I like that the hotel is within walking distance of shops, a church for Sunday mass, and the canal. If you visit in December, be sure to check out the boat display on the canal! We dined at the Wye Oak Tavern, which was fantastic! The prices were on par with other restaurants, but the food is much fancier. They've got burgers, but also broccoli (I didn't expect to like the broccoli so much, but it's amazing), a cool beet dish, pastas, and very good fish. We liked the restaurant so much we made the hour drive two weeks later to try it all again! The Visitation has a coffee shop where we grabbed coffee to go before heading out. Highly recommend!

My wife and my first night at the Visitation Hotel hotel was Awesome! Downtown Frederick so needed an option for overnight stays! The rooms were very clean and had some cool history on the walls with with old photos of nuns who taught at the school and artifacts they found on the site while building. Such a neat reuse of a 150-year-old building instead of just tearing it down and building new like so many do these days! We would definitely recommend checking this unique hotel out at your next visit to Frederick! Don't forget to eat at the restaurant on site, Wye Oak Tavern! Incredible food!