On a trip with friends and had just spent a week in a villa in Tuscany. Our last 3 nights were in Florence at this charming hotel. Great location, accomodating staff, upscale rooms and lovely bath, great little bar with reflecting pool and waterfall effect...

In short: Fabulous location, great reception, delicious smell, comfortable rooms, lovely decor, tasty breakfast, why would you want to stay anywhere else? We arrived at the hotel after midnight (issues with Navman in central Florence not recognising one way streets!!) and had a warm and efficient welcome to the hotel. The first thing I noticed was how nice the reception area smelt, they have scented candles burning which give the area a subtle but lovely spicy smell, which was refreshing. The room and bathroom were spacious and the beds comfortable. The location on Santa Maria Novella Piazza is fabulous, walking distance to everything. Duomo is an easy 5 minute walk behind the hotel with San Lorenzo market 5 minutes on from there. Uffitzi and Ponte Vecchio are about 10 minutes or so, it's all flat so very easy. The furtherest walk is Piazale Michaelangelo, which after you have scaled the stairs is about 30 minutes, but most definately worth doing (there are buses if you aren't up to it!). Reception have maps and are great at highlighting areas and directions (they were most useful in helping us with driving directions, due to the frustrating one-ways!). Breakfast was delicious and had the nicest view of SMN piazza. 2 things I will say are: if you are trying to find the hotel on foot, or car, especially in the dark, the hotel does not have big neon signs highlighting its existence, it has a little brass name plate, so once you get to SMN piazza head behind the Hotel Roma, you will find it there, sitting quietly. The other thing to note is there are a maze of one way streets in central Florence that are a nightmare to navigate, if you don't have to drive, just don't. If you are driving, be aware that there are camera's in the centra area which will fine any non local cars for driving there, this is not a problem if you are using hotel parking as they log onto the city web and revert the charge.
Basically this hotel is all good and definately worth staying in!

The good:
* Charming historic hotel
* Beautiful rooms with historic details
* Free wifi (though this was sometimes flaky in the room)
* Good location, 5 minutes walk to station and 5 minutes to main attractions
* Parking agreement with a parking station for a fee
* Beautiful breakfast room overlooking piazza with good food

The bad:
* Difficult to find if driving
* Small gym with little equipment

Overall
I would definitely stay at this hotel when I return to Florence. It offers reasonable value, but the hotel has loads of charm.

The hotel L'Orologio is beautiful and located perfectly. Easy to walk to museums, restaurants, the river and train station. The staff was very helpful with directions and restaurants. The only negative is that our room was extremely dark! Our room faced a small street with a building next to it. We had no sunlight and the dark ceiling made it feel even darker.