I booked this through hotels.com and because I got such a reasonable deal, I did not expect much. I was extremely pleasantly surprised.
The location is perfect for the train station and within easy walking distance of all the major cultural destinations in the city.
My room was newly renovated and very nicely designed. The bathroom with bath tub and shower was spotlessly clean.
The staff were always friendly and happy to assist and the buffet breakfast was good with a wide choice (quite a rarity in this city)
I have visited Florence for the last 20 years at least twice a year, so I am familiar with many of the hotels and this one scores highly.
I loved staying here and will definately return.

We stayed at the Ambasciatori over the Christmas, New Year Holiday. What a nice hotel. Can't qualify it as boutique because 500+ rooms however it did have the boutique feel. We got the romance package which was awesome! The restaurant included in the package was next door, authentic Italian food. Best gnocchi we had while in Italy. We stayed in room 516 allowing us to wake to the most breathtaking view of the Domo every morning. We could actually lay in bed and still see it at night!! Awesome:). The hotel is located right in front of the train station and walking distance to open market shopping and many sites. Uffizi 15 minute walk. The lounge is also one of the high points. Beautifully decorated, ultra modern and comfortable. Would definitely return.

We had problems with this hotel from the beginning. Our group arrived on the noon and since rooms weren't ready yet stuff suggested to leave luggage in the check-room. Being completely sure that our baggage was in safe we left for a tour by Florence. There was no limit to my astonishment on return when we figured out that luggage room is open for every one! Just that easy. After that we were forced to change 2 rooms in a row because first room was stinky and terribly noisy, just above construction yard and kitchen chimney and second one smelt slightly better then cow-house, even after we emphasized that we didn't like previous apartment especially for that reason. In the end they allocated us a tiny room on fifth floor (no match for 4* star hotels requirements). All that time stuff was very uncooperative (except bag-boy), and we didn't heard a singe word of apologize for situation.
P.S.
Florence itself is a miracle!!

We reached Florence on 9 Dec 2011 morning. The first joy was finding the hotel is right across the Firenze Station, soon it was disappointment.

We find the male hotel staff’s attitude at the check in is very unwelcoming, especially to Asian travelers. We were next in the line to check in while we were queuing a bit to the left of the guests in front of us. Another local Italian travelers came about 5mins later and queued slightly to the right. After the guests in front left, we went up but was curtly waved to stand aside by the male hotel staff and he insisted the Italian travelers came before us. The Italian travelers even try to explain to him we were ahead of them but he refused to listen, and all these while he spoke but never even look at us nor tell us to queue up after the pair of Italian travelers he insisted on serving first.

Slightly before our incident, another Asian traveler wanted to exchange her key pass and was sternly “warn” by him she need to queue in future. While another local traveler could get a quick reply from him politely.

This double standard is really distasteful. If the hotel do not served Asian travelers, they should state so. We are happily to book elsewhere. Our experience in Venice and Rome is 100% much nicer and welcoming!

While we finally could check in when another female staff came into the counter. She is much better in attitude than the male staff, but only slight.

I must said our experience in other Italy hotels is really so much better. Small gestures like internet log-in information would be passed to us at the check-in counter or have the slip brought up to our room later. For Ambasciatori we were impolitely asked go down personally to reception to request when we phoned the receptionist from our room.

Beware of using the safe of this hotel. Due to the safe was not unlocked by the previous guest, we were given a mater-key password to unlock the safe. We let the password slip lying around and went out only returned to find the safe was unlocked. Well we cannot really determined if we did accidentally left it opened but we found out the master-key can be used to open the safe even after we changed to our personal password, except from closing it which you need to key in the changed password. Nothing was lost but this is very frightening.
Ambasciatori really leaved a bad taste and experience.

Albeit the poor service and I must said the room is in good conditions and cleanliness. The executive double we got is the largest one so far in our travel through Italy and we were given the handicapped room (we did not request this).

They have a very large and nicely modern decorated lounge with comfortable sofa seats.

The stay could have been much more better if not for the poor receptionist service. I would not recommend the stay even if the room is fantastic.