Stay Report:11/05/21-11/08/21 (3 nights/Friday thru Monday)

Note: I am a lowly Discoverist by virtue of having the original Hyatt Rewards Credit Card that I cancelled in December 2020 and will retain this status through February 2023. So this is the basis from which I write this stay report.

Why Here: Had 2 Category 1-4 certs expiring at the end of 2021 and wanted to be somewhere on Manhattan for the The NYC Delicatessen DO: Sunday, November 7th, 2021 and potentially the OMNI Bugger Semi-Virtual DO #16: Saturday, November 6, 2021 in NYC. Gild Hall is/was the only Hyatt Cat 4 available. Also, this stay allowed me to check off Thompson Hotels to add as one of the brands for the Brand Explorer earning progression.

Reservation: Reserved a 1 Standard King using the 2 certs + 15K points. Had problems booking using this certs + points combo and ended up having to call Hyatt directly to work with me over the phone when, during one of my attempts to book the reservation when awry and one of the certs went into a limbo state. Reservation was booked approximately 2 weeks prior to our arrival date. One other thing to note is that the NYC Marathon was scheduled and held on Sunday, November 7th. Turns out that while this reservation wasn't affected by the marathon, our eventual access to the 2nd Ave Deli via subway as well as further explorations around Midtown were affected on that Sunday.

Property/Location: As others have noted, this property is in Lower Manhattan, close by Wall Street/Financial District, Seaport District. Not having stayed in Lower Manhattan before, wasn't sure what to expect but wanted to see how things would play out here. Hotel is a repurposed residential building with a newer facade but its floor layout is clearly reflective of what could be crammed into this plot of land as a residential facility.




As is common across all of Manhattan, the attached building to the immediate northwest is being worked on affecting pedestrian and vehicular access along Platt Street where the main/real entrance to the hotel is located.

Hotel has 16 floors with guest rooms. Felice and its dining/seating options occupy both the Lobby and Mezzanine levels of the building (L and C). Haven't a clue what's down in the basement (LR).




Check In: Rather than checking in with the app, Mrs. DELee and I decided to go directly from our arrival overnight stay near EWR to the hotel and ended up getting to Gild Hall with our luggage around 1 PM. Front Desk indicated that the room would not be ready any earlier than 3 PM so we checked our luggage and went wandering around Lower Manhattan, walked down to the piers along South Street, had lunch in a tavern in the Financial District and got back to the hotel around 3. Were told that we were being upgraded to a 1 King Deluxe as a Discoverist, picked up our luggage and room keys and went upstairs.

Room: Room assigned was 129 - immediately across from the elevators. Here's my photos:







Also, here's the floor layout from the back of room door:


You can see that there are smaller rooms (probably the standard kings) further away from the elevators and the general shape/floor plan of the hotel building.

Room and its features: 1 king and its "custom leather headboard"


















The minibar area and fridge:













Room safe and no robes in wardrobe:




Bathroom did not have the issues that escape4 had in their first room:


However, if you're sharing the room, know that even with the ruled glass that covers the bathroom, you're still fairly visible as well as fully illuminating the room when all lights are out at night.

Room lights on:


Room lights off, bathroom light on (with the bathroom light switch fairly close to the shower/tub and nowhere near the bathroom door):


Room window, view and blinds:

The window for room 129 has a great view of the buildings across Platt Street. Additionally, pigeons like to roost, mate(?) and poop on the window sill so be warned that you might get awakened at 6 am.

Rather than post one of those photos here, I invite folks to go to the Crappy Views from My Hotel Room thread where many such examples of rather poor/crappy views and windows abound and where a photo of this room's view is located.

The other issue that we had with the room and its window is the slat blinds used to darken the room and the non-functional drapes. The drapes on the ends are solely decorative. Note that there is no blackout blind.


And with the wooden slat blind as installed and supposedly closed tight, the lights from the building across the street flood through the gaps of the slats making for very poor darkness conditions desired for sleeping (especially for folks on West Coast time).


Housekeeping in the current COVID-19 era, water bottles and other stuff:

We left the room and removed the do not disturb door hangar each day when we left the room and left a tip on the bed. Each day, when we returned, the room had been serviced by housekeeping - we did not have to request housekeeping services and were very much appreciative of the service:




Additionally, we received bags of complimentary water outside our room door each day except for the last/departure day:


And, by day 3, had amassed a few bottles:


For those desiring an AM coffee fix, there's a Nespresso machine in the lobby available from 6 to 10 am for guest to use and quaff:


One feature which we didn't get a chance to use were the hotel's bicycles:


As well as dine at Felice:

This was as far as we ever got to the restaurant. Perhaps had I had Globalist status I might have been able to persuade Mrs. to go and try to see if we could get potatoes with our breakfast (and perhaps a fork) but, alas, we did not ever dine there.

Overall: After all is said and done, I would return to this property. It is clearly not the largest hotel nor with the largest rooms. It provides a unique award redemption option for Hyatt-based travelers to use and I found that I much preferred Lower Manhattan to Midtown or Chelsea/Fashion District and very much above anything I've ever stayed on the East Side of Manhattan.

David