Not so "mal" (bad) after all
4
4
Date of visit: July 2025
I am a disabled person. I have experience of challenges around: a hidden impairment and moving around.
Overall Rating
Good
Hotel Malmaison in Leeds is stylish and comfortable. I felt quite fancy in my spacious room, complete with large TV, desk, fridge, tea set, safe, ironing board, hairdryer and spare pillows. The architecture especially at the entrance is more interesting than perhaps practical, so you need to take a platform lift to access the normal lifts. All well and good when it works, but unfortunately it was quite temperamental during my visit.
Disabled Access In and Around
Average
The entrance is at street level and has a revolving door as well as a button-operated automatic door to its left, which opens to the outside left. The button is on a pole on the left-hand side leading up to the door. When exiting, the button for the door is on the wall to the right of the door. You enter onto a mid-sized landing with stairs going up in the middle and down to the side. There is a platform lift on the left side to take you down to the level of the reception (around to the right) and the restaurant (to the left). From there, you can take one of two lifts up to the other levels. During my stay, there were unfortunately ongoing problems with the platform lift. All but one time I was eventually able to use it with the help of the staff, but I ended up spending more time waiting and stressed than necessary. I was assured that this was a new issue and that they were going to get someone in to fix it, so I hope that this was a unique experience. I recommend having the phone number for reception handy just in case. Between the two lifts in the lobby there is a large sign in white on black with Braille markings telling you which floor you are on. The lift call buttons on either side of it have raised arrows next to them and light up when pressed. The buttons on the inside also have raised labels and Braille next to them and light up. The lifts have handrails on either side and a mirror at the back. The entrance, and restaurant as well as the area on the ground floor in front of the lifts have hard floors. In front of reception, inside the lifts and on the corridors and in the rooms has low carpets. The reception counter has no lowered sections. There is some upholstered seating in the reception and lift lobby area, most of it low armchairs without armrests. The seating in the restaurant is mostly moveable upholstered chairs with backrests and either no armrests or a wraparound backrest. There is also some booth-style seating along the walls and high stools with backrests along the bar. The door to the room has a lever handle. It is not automatic and opens to the inside right. It is just regular width, which was just about wide enough for my powerchair (62 cm), but it would have been nice to have a bit more space on the sides. As you enter, there are wardrobes to your left that have knob handles and doors opening to the outside. The room is spacious and I could reach everywhere in my chair except for the far side of the bed. There is a large desk along the back left wall that has a chair, but also worked well to sit at in my wheelchair. The bed is on the right wall. I found it to be a comfortable height for getting up from, but it might be a little high for people who need to transfer directly from a wheelchair. The nearside of the bed has a button for an alarm call by the nightstand and an emergency door release button next to that. The light switches are in the same row, so take care not to confuse them! Also on the right side, closer to the middle of the room, are an armchair and a wall mirror. There is a socket there, several sockets by the desk and USB charging ports by the bed. The room has air conditioning that I was not able to figure out how to control and since I am quite sensitive to sound, I found the hum a bit annoying. There is also a window, but it is quite high up and with a deep windowsill, so it is not easy to open.
Accessible facilities: Lift to all areas, Step-free entrance, Seating at regular intervals
Parking & Transport
Good
I travelled to this place by walk or wheel
I chose the hotel for its proximity to the train station, which is a 0.3-mile/8-minute walk or wheel away. The closest bus stops are for Trinity on Briggate (0.1-mile/3-minute walk or wheel) and Boar Lane (0.2-mile/5-minute walk or wheel). There is some limited on-street parking on Concordia Street and Sovereign Street. There are also multiple paid multi-storey car parks, some with EV chargers nearby, for example Q-Park Sovereign Square.
Accessible facilities: Public or on street parking
Accessible Toilets
Good
My hotel room had a medium-sized accessible bathroom. The door is on the right a few meters into the room. There is no door opener. The door opens to the outside right. The handle is a lever. There is a handrail on the back of the door and it locks with a twist knob. There is also a hook high up on the back of the door. The floor is small checkered tiles and the vertical and horizontal surfaces around the white sink and bath are dark and therefore have a good contrast. There is a large mirror above a sink set into a counter facing you as you come in. The sink is lowered and sticks out from the cabinet for easier access. There are separate hot and cold short lever taps. There is a liquid soap dispenser mounted on the wall to the left of the sink and a fixed vertical handrail on a wall to the right of the sink. The toilet is in space to your right as you enter. There is a fixed vertical and a horizontal handrail to the left of the toilet that can be lifted and moved out of the way and a fixed horizontal handrail on the wall to the right of the toilet. The flush is push button set into the cistern cupboard behind the toilet. The toilet paper holder is to the right of the toilet. There is space for a right-side transfer. There is an electric towel rack mounted onto the wall to the right of the door as you enter with a small foot-pedal bin underneath, but I think the transfer space is still sufficiently large. There is no red cord by the toilet. The bathtub is to the left as you enter. I was told the rim was lower than a standard bathtub, but I do not know enough about tub height to confirm that. There are a diagonal and a vertical handrail on the wall beside the bath. Wall-mounted dispensers for shampoo and soap are between them. There is a glass shower screen on a hinge covering the front half. There is a hand-held shower with an adjustable-height wall mount at the right-hand narrow end of the bathtub. There is also a bath tap with short-levered hot and cold taps on the same side just above the rim of the tub. An anti-slip mat is provided. The red emergency cord is on the end of the bath opposite the taps and it was quite tied up.
Facilities: Accessible toilet
Staff
Excellent
The staff were very friendly and helpful. Most of the time they were appropriately apologetic about accessibility issues and worked hard to resolve or bypass them. When we could not get the platform lift to work, I decided to take the steps up. They offered to assist me up the steps and brought my bag and powerchair up to my room. I had some nice conversations with reception staff about their favourite places in the area and when I ordered in food, they were happy to get it from the driver and bring it up to me. Although the reception desk had no lowered section, they made an effort to make it comfortable for me to check in from a seated position, handing me forms to fill along with a notepad to stabilise the paper.
