Paddington Apartments

Extremely misleading and false marketing and poor service – avoid My City Residences / Paddington Apartments We booked Paddington Apartments (20 Chilworth Street, London) via *********** in April 2025 for a stay in late September and early October 2025, and it turned out to be one of the worst travel experiences we’ve had. Instead of the bright and modern apartment shown online, we were assigned a basement flat with dark rooms, dungeon like, accessed by steep, narrow stairs, and with a cramped and claustrophobic atmosphere. None of this was disclosed on the booking page. The apartment was asigned to us and not chosen by us. The apartment was like entering a cave and poorly maintained, with cheap tired furniture and an unpleasant smell. When we complained, both My City Residences and ***********, they just refused to take responsibility and pointed fingers at each other. No refund or assistance. After further research, we found many reviews describing the same issues — misleading photos, unclean rooms, and lack of customer support. Bottom line: Fantastic location, but absolutely terrible management. Unless you enjoy a prison environment and a basement cage sold as “bright apartments”, stay away from this place. Legal actions has therefore been taken.

The place looks exactly like the photos and is in a great location, just a few minutes’ walk from Paddington Station. However, some sections of the apartment were not properly cleaned, so I had to spend time cleaning up before settling in. The building did offer to send someone to clean, but since I arrived late, it could only be arranged the next morning, which was no longer useful. Additionally, my unit was located in the basement with no elevator access, meaning I had to carry my bags down a long flight of stairs. It would be helpful if the listing clearly mentioned that this is a lower ground apartment so future guests know what to expect.

We had apartment 4 which is right at the front and first apartment you come to. You can hear when everyone is coming and going, the main door is very loud. The tv in the room barely worked and the water heater on the wall in the bathroom burned my upper arm abit twice while I was getting ready. However, it’s in a wonderful location, only one train to airport and train station is right around the corner.. so close. We walked through Hyde Park to Harrods from the apartment. It was a beautiful walk. Be careful at the near by restaurants, someone pretending to sell flowers stole my phone. Which cost me a lot of money. Never leave your phone out for even 2 seconds.

Cute little units with all the amenities I was looking for: 2-burner cooker, fridge, kettle ... We were on the ground floor for both our stays. The first looked onto the street, which was lovely. The other had two windows, both into a 6x6-foot "courtyard" bounded on all sides by other units. I did wonder what I would do if there were a fire that made the door unusable. Also, it's a very quiet area but all the doors in the building seem to slam shut, so when people arrived or left in the middle of the night, we definitely knew. I'd still highly recommend it and would stay there again.

First, the best things about this property: 1) Location 2) Elevator 3) Coffee and tea supplies 4) Shampoo and soaps provided. Second, the bad things about this property: 1) There’s no front desk, so there’s nowhere to leave luggage while you explore 2) The beds are old. The double bed crunched like an old beanbag chair and one aide dipped terribly. The single was lumpy. The fold down couch creaked. 3) We asked for a travel crib three times and it wasn’t included. 4) When traveling with small children, beware, the cutlery is in a bottom and easily accessible drawer. 5) You can hear everything the neighbours above and below you are doing. 6) If you’re a small person, the shower is okay. If you’re on the larger side, you’ll barely be able to turn around. 7) There is a glass table with terribly sharp edges, not kid friendly. 8) There were piles of bedding on the landings between floors on the landings and outside the rooms. All in all, if you are looking for somewhere close to Paddington for a short term stay, it’ll do.

Please note - I did not stay at this apartment but the experience I had with them was horrendous - I have never had such poor communication or customer service in my life! To summarise we had booked a 3 bedroom apartment for 4 adults. The confirmation of where to pick up the keys came through less than an hour before we arrived (at 4pm not 1pm as we were originally advised) Upon collecting the keys and entering the apartment we found this to be a 1 bedroom apartment. We could not get through to the person / company we had booked through – texts and calls were unanswered ( I did reach the facilities manager however who was on holiday abroad and was still more contactable than the person managing our booking) When we were finally contacted we were told the room was unavailable 3 days prior to our stay – Bedbugs were found! We had been moved into alternative accommodation. Not only was this not communicated to us in ANY way but we were also moved from a 3 bedroom apartment for 4 people to a one bedroom apartment with 1 double bed! How anyone could think this was a suitable substitution is beyond me. I am still at a loss as to why this was not communicated to me! By this time we had 1 hour to get ready for a black tie event in London and had no further time to waste. We had no choice but to check into a local hotel Once at the hotel we had newly booked I was contacted with another “alternative” – not only was this too late for consideration (and we had no faith in booking again) but it was also again unstable – a 2 bedroom apartment and almost 30 minutes from the original location. In addition when searching for last minute accommodation in London the 3 bedroom apartment was still showing as available! It is obviously used to fish for customers and I would question whether the 3 bedroom apartment actually exists! Whilst we have been refunded for the amount we had paid I am beyond disappointed at the communication and how we were treated and I am looking for compensation for the additional accommodation in London we had to source