We stayed for 4 nights at the Sihe hotel and really enjoyed being in a courtyard style Chinese house (of which there are not many left now in Beijing). The staff were friendly although seemed shy and a little reticent - I think this might explain the previous comment about lack of conversation. However the timid breakfast lady did respond when my husband tried out his fledgling Mandarin with her each day, you just had to make the effort!

The room wasn't the largest, in fact it was a strange shape - very long and thin - and stuffed full of antique-style Chinese rosewood furniture including a great four poster bed, which was lovely and comfortable with great crisp white cotton linen. The bathroom was surprisingly modern considering the rest of the property but I'd agree with the previous comment that the towels were not up to scratch - grey and thin with frayed edges. Good walk in shower though. Agree that there was nowhere to put suitcase except on floor.

A very good feature was that there were lots of English language listings magazines and weekly local guides (Time Out style) which made you feel a lot more connected to the city and that you knew what was going on and that your info on restaurants, bars etc was totally up to date. Other more upmarket Western chain hotels we stayed in did not provide these sort of magazines.

TV only had 2 English channels and one of them had no sound! However you don't come to Beijing and stay in this sort of hotel and then spend time watching TV, you should be out and about exploring!

Breakfast was not a huge feast of food although it was replenished if you needed more. With only 12 rooms it's unfair to expect them to put on a massive spread each day. However we are not the earliest risers and this meant our choice was a bit more limited - on days when we got up earlier there was a lot more food on offer.

The trip (1 day with a driver ) we booked through the hotel to the Great Wall at Simatai was fine, it was 750yuan which was more than the other Wall locations but this was fair as it's a lot further. From what we could gather, a local taxi driver would probably have charged 700 so a good price to know that it was all arranged by the hotel.

The hutong that the hotel is located in is great, as other reviewers have said, you can see authentic hutong life going on all around you. Also the main street (Dongsi Nandajie) is full of funky little shops and really great value local restaurants which were good. Subway station nearby as well as a supermarket and it's about 20mins walk to Tiananmen Sq.

All in all this hotel seems pretty unique in Beijing and I would certainly recommend others to choose it over the dull Western chains alternatives. However being realistic when compared to those alternatives the price (we paid around 75GBP a night) is too high for the facilities and service you get. I guess you are paying over the odds for a unique experience. If you're not happy to do this then go elsewhere.

Unlike most other reviewers here, I found this hotel to be disappointing and poor value for money - and I have lived in, and travelled extensively across, Asia for six years.

The hotel seems to be trading off its image as a quaint, old-fashioned, Chinese style inn, and is charging foreign guests a premium price for what is, in fact, modest "bed-and-breakfast" service and facilities.

First, the cost. I stayed for two nights at CNY 880 a night, including service, for a so-called "deluxe" room. I had stayed the previous two nights in an Executive Floor room at the Holiday Inn Central Plaza, currently ranked 1st out of 1,083 hotels in Beijing on tripadvisor.com, for less than a quarter more (CNY 1,094 a night). The comparison could not have been more stark in terms of levels of customer service, facilities and food quality. Do not misunderstand me: I never expected full-service Holiday Inn style facilities at the Sihe, but I did expect service, quality and facilities, in some form, that would justify paying over 80% of the Holiday Inn rate.

I had a tiny room (815 I think) at the Sihe, albeit with a large double bed and clean sheets, but with not even enough room for two people to pass each other, and certainly no space for luggage to be properly stored and accessed - and there was absolutely nowhere else to rest a suitcase than on the floor.

The bathroom was a square about the width of two small shower cubicles, with stains on the floor from from leaking pipes, thin and fraying towels, and not even enough shelf space to unpack toiletries.

The televison was an old cathode ray tube model (flat-screen would have freed some precious shelf-space), with maybe 30 Chinese channels and just HBO and CCTV 9 in English: amazing, considering that it seems to be almost exclusively non-Chinese guests staying here. Free internet access is offered - this worked at first attempt and then was down (along with HBO!) on the second day.

Second, the ambience. The staff were never exactly unfriendly, but equally at no point was there even the slightest gesture of friendliness towards us. The "welcome" at reception was a simple: "Can I have your passport?". Even though my reservation clearly stated that two of us were staying, and two of us arrived together, the hotel assumed it was just me staying (and had gone so far as to remove a set of towels just in case I had dared to use them as well as my own!). When the two of us came back to the hotel later on, the staff must have realised that there were indeed two of us and came chasing after us to get a copy of the second passport (they later presented us with the towels that had been removed).

I have no idea if the staff are competent in English - they should be, if they are charging sky-high prices to international visitors - because there was never any conversation or greetings from them. There is also an atmosphere of "We know we have to have guests staying here, but we would rather you weren't here and we don't trust you anyway" about the place: for example, printed labels on the cheap-n-cheerful Lux shampoo bottle to remind us that it "is not a gift" (in other words, don't dare think that you can take it with you!); being followed out onto the street to ask us to check out at 10am even though we had just left our luggage at reception, deposited the key, and had said we were returning a couple of hours later; being asked to sign on arrival a pre-authorisation of 100% of the room charges on my Amex card (this has never happened to me in any hotel anywhere in the world, and certainly did not at the Holiday Inn two days earlier).

Third, the breakfast. This is included in the CNY 880 but is poor value - we tried it the first morning, went to McDonalds instead the second morning. Of course the buffet was smaller than at the Holiday Inn, but it was the quality of the food that was such a disappointment - stale bread and cake, oily omelette, packet juice - all very basic and cheap stuff. A timid waitress watched over us eating in the tiny breakfast room, on low stools, never greeted us in any way, and re-stocked items on the buffet only when it was clear there was almost nothing left to choose from. It reminded me of breakfast at some of the youth hostels that I've stayed in.

I repeat again that I did not expect five-star, international brand hotel standards, but I did very much expect value-for-money, and my stay was very poor value for money overall. My suggestion for first-time visitors to China, or Asia generally, who want to see and experience an authentic Chinese neighbourhood, is to spend their CNY 880 on a hotel that has facilities to match that price (such as the Holiday Inn) and simply pop across to the Sihe one day to take a few photos inside of the courtyard (which is actually not impressive in any way at all).

In fact, the most interesting part of the hotel is what is outside, not inside: watching the daily life of the people who live in the hutong (lane) where the hotel is situated. Bear in mind also the hotel is barely accessible by car - our taxi dropped us on the main road, and we wheeled our bags down the lane to the hotel (a 5-10 minute walk).

We really enjoyed staying here. The staff is wonderfully friendly and helpful--they even packed us a breakfast when we had to catch an early flight out. The striking thing about the hotel is how quiet it is. Your basically in the middle of Beijing, and once you get to the hotel you really cannot hear any city noise.

They have free internet, a decent breakfast (w/ Western options), and the rooms were very clean.

We stayed in two different rooms. The standard, which was a little on the small side, but had a newly remodeled bathroom, and a suite. The suite was comparable to the standard in terms of cleanliness and comfort, but it was about twice the size of the standard.

The front desk staff also helped us arrange a taxi to the Great Wall at Mutianyu. It's about a 90 minute drive out there, and we had the driver from 9:00 - 5:30 all for around 500 Yuan. Their regular driver was unavailable, but the alternate driver was super nice and he spoke some english. He also took us to a wonderful dumpling place after the trek.

If you do this trip, do yourself a favor and take the cable cars up (NOT the ski lift). Head left at your first opportunity, then circle back and take the toboggan down. If you take the ski lift, you will basically be climbing uphill all day long.

The hotel is pretty close to Tianamen Square, the forbidden City, Beihei park, etc. We took taxi's to most of these places (the average price being about 15 Yuan ($2.50).

To get there, we took the express train from the airport (25 Yuan per person). You need to transfer to the No. 2 at Dongzhimen. Then transfer to the No. 5 at Yonghegong (one stop). From there get off at Dongsi. It's about a 5 minute walk from the Dongsi station.

FYI - We took a cab back to the airport and it cost around 80 Yuan (without traffic).

Be sure to get the hotel card with its Chinese name written on it. We had a few instances where the taxi's didn't know where it was. You might want to get the Dongsi metro station written in Chinese so that you have a landmark that most taxi's know about.

We have just returned from Beijing were we stayed in this authentic little hotel situated in the Hutong. It was an amazing experience. The hotel is truly chinese with traditional furniture and atmosphere. On arrival there we were very scepticle of this little alley way and whether it will be safe living in this narrow residential street. Well, well to our surprise, I must admit that the most friendly, helpful and sincere people live in this hutong. The hotel staff were super. Always ready to help and advice when needed. The room was very small, with just enough space to move around the bed but still very clean and authentic. After all you don't live there you only sleep there. The bed was big and comfortable and so was the bathroom. We would go back there any time. Well done Sihe staff, you made our stay very comfortable. Great people!!!