If anyone from the Ovolo Southside is reading this, please… STOP TRYING SO HARD!
To enjoy this secluded boutique hotel on the south side of Hong Kong island you’ll need to constantly avert your eyes from the garish neon puns that seem to assault you from all sides. It’s especially embarrassing when you compare the nightclub vibe to the actual guests staying here; the clientèle and “ambiance” don’t match up at all—at least they didn’t during my stay.
The forced hipster aesthetic was far and away my least favourite thing about this property—wouldn’t blacklit-only corridors be an evacuation hazard? Anyway, here are some additional impressions, from bad to good to pretty great.
Breakfast
The breakfast buffet happens on the second floor. Here I got my first indication that this Ovolo’s promise of party central was a lie. There were no hungover club-goers stumbling in from a night on the town—only families, business people and my girlfriend and I.
The Ovolo Group is affiliated with Starwood Preferred Guest program, but don’t make the rookie mistake of booking through SPG.com; the only way to score yourself a complimentary breakfast is by booking directly with Ovolo. What you get with that free breakfast ticket includes fruit, cereal, yogurt, cheese, cold cuts, bread, pastries, juice and coffee.
You’ll have to pay a $35 HKD extra for additional hot items like eggs. The Southside also offers a dish they call “hipster toast”, because of course they do…
I indulged one morning in the French Toast, only really worth it for those sweet, sweet 35 SPG points.
One Final point about food: The in-room refreshments include complimentary access to the mini-bar and also a loot bag—which brings us to…
Room
We stayed in a corner deluxe room on a lower floor. At first glance it looked like a privacy nightmare; thankfully the big windows had two sets of motorized blinds that lowered from the ceiling, one that still let light through and another that didn’t. The room was on the small size but manageable; just expect that you’ll have to close up your luggage and get it out of the way when it’s not in use.
Just for fun I requested to see a bigger room, what the Southside calls a “long loft”. The bathroom seemed to be about the same size as ours—again, a bit tight but perfectly usable.
But while the room was definitely bigger its layout didn’t seem to provide much more in the way of usable space. I reckon that for a couple a corner deluxe should be fine.
Location
The Southside is just over a block from Wong Chuk Hang Station on the new (for us) MTR South Island Line. You can get here from Admiralty in less than twenty minutes. I timed it. Compared to Wan Chai, Sheung Wan and other neighbourhoods I’ve stayed in, this part of the island is comparatively quiet. For now.
Price
The Ovolo Southside gave us a lot of value for our travel dollar. A deluxe room in a four-star hotel with breakfast for about $200 CAD per night certainly worked for us.
Recommendations
If you’ve got business on the south side of Hong Kong island, or a family that wants to be near Ocean Park then the Ovolo Southside is an obvious choice. For couples, however, I’d still recommend the one-of-a-kind student-run T-Hotel in Pok Fu Lam. Despite being only accessible by bus or taxi, that hotel will give you a much bigger room, a better breakfast and the five-star service of tomorrow, today!
And as an added bonus, you won’t cringe so much at the stuff hanging on the walls. 
To score that complimentary breakfast, book your stay here: Ovolo Southside
