I spent one week there in March 2004 with my sister and a friend. The hostel is actually behind the Duomo on the third floor of a historic (everything in that area is historic) building. The rooms are not huge, the furniture isn't that fancy, and there are 3 standard bathrooms. The location of this place is fantastic. If you go to Florence and are expecting to stay in your room, you need to have your head examined. There is nothing wrong with this place, and the owner was very friendly and was usually available for questions.

WHen I had a chance to stay in Italy for a few days after a conference, I booked the cheapest hostel I could find that didn't involve bunk beds and strangers- Proconsolo Rooms 2 at E18 per person per night. I wasn't expecting much- I figured we weren't going to be spending much time in a room anyway. Wow- apparently they own several apartments in Florence, and we got a bedroom in a 4-bedroom flat on the European third floor, with a shared sitting room and a balcony looking out directly onto the Duomo. (If you want to try to book it yourself, the address was of that flat was 13 Borgo Pinti.) Aside from having a fantastic view, it was clean, quiet, pleasant and located within a few minutes' walk of Santa Croce, the Duomo, the Piazza della Signoria, etc. If you've ever wanted to stay behind those huge imposing European doors- this is the place!

Proconsolo Rooms are very centrally located and cheap, which is the best I can tell. We had booked a four bedded room and actually had a double bed and one camp bed. No frescoed ceilings but stain due to water spotting... We?ve stayed there for one week and one of the three bathrooms was cleaned once! In the end taking a shower became rather disgusting. Nevertheless the host is very nice and helps you, whenever you need help. Moreover there is no curfew, what makes it sometimes very loud at night...

Stayed there in March 2004. Horrible! A look at their webpage is totally misleading. Frescos...hmm..only in three rooms. Other rooms are horrible, no heating (7-9 degrees C at night in March) no cleaning, not even upon your arrival. We found a dust bin in our room full of garbage. The bathrooms are cleaned once a week, nothing works properly.
Our neighbors showed no respect to privacy and were laughing loudly at midnight. The owners, a Croatian lady and her very suspicious partner Vladimir, didn't give us any receipt, so we could only hope the money we payed went to Brussels as part of Italy's contribution to EU. The only good thing about this place is that it was very centrally located.