I stayed here recently for several nights and my overall takeaway is that I wouldn't bother coming back at any prices anywhere near what they're currently charging. I know NYC hotel availability is very tight, but I just wouldn't feel good about paying these prices for the "400" square foot room that feels a lot smaller than that. For the record, I stayed on points which was a MUCH better deal than paying cash (prices for my room for my dates moved around between $1200 and $1700 per night).
Here's the room I had:
https://www.ritzcarlton.com/en/hotel...dtn-Floorplans
If that's 400 sq ft, then too much of it is in the bathroom. In fact, the shower is huge, which makes no sense since the rainshower, hand-held shower, faucet, and shelf are all crowded into one dark end. And it's designed with the levers behind the rain shower - I never get how designers don't see the problem with that. Raising and lowering the hand-held scrapes your knuckles against the shelf. How do they not test that out? Anyway, the key to the huge shower, I suppose, is the steam shower aspect. I never got that to work well, and there's no bench in the shower so I'm not sure how I would have enjoyed it. The toilet area is equally huge and unnecessary. The sink area is fine - not enough shelf space for my taste, but still more than plenty of hotels. The doors to the shower and toilet feel like they both open the wrong way to me. The shower especially should open in, in my estimation.
Bed was very, very comfortable. No question there. Good pillows too.
There was one chair in the room. My wife and I had a Zoom meeting while staying there, so that was pretty awkward. I suppose we could have requested another chair temporarily. I was surprised there was no desk at all.
While the finishes in the room were very nice, it just felt lacking. There was no art on the walls at all. The curtains were manually operated (pretty surprising at this price level for new NYC construction, actually). The only real style in the room was the light fixture, which I did like.
Beyond the room, we never tried the restaurant or bar. We did use the gym - fine, typical, underground gym.
Our elite recognition was what you'd expect at a Ritz: high floor, begrudging late checkout, and 1,000 Marriott points for my Titanium status. So, almost nothing at all.
Location is a weird one for me. This was pretty convenient to where we needed to be and right at the R train and reasonably close to the 1, 6, and F trains. But nothing was really right there. That's fine - I'm not sure I could really do better without being in maybe the West Village or the Lower East Side, which are what they are, in part, because they lack chain hotels. That's life around 34th and Fifth - it's just not a cozy neighborhood. But the location overall was a net positive for this trip, I'd say, even if it wasn't right in the middle of anything special.
Being more of a Hyatt person, I'd go back to the Andaz Fifth or 50 Bowery next time probably. Frankly, the locations of those two are a little less convenient for me, but for less than half the price of this place, I'd be happy at either.
Finally, we spent one night at the Langham over on Fifth and it made me realize how much of a premium there is to hotels in chains. That was less expensive, and a much larger, nicer room (if aged). I'm really trying to see a time where I stop with the hotel points and elite status that really turns out to be underwhelming and disappointing and find more good small hotels and AirBNBs and things and just stay, enjoy, and leave without any perks or points or qualifying nights or any of that.