Someone sent me the following article about a month ago:

Boutique Hotels' Dilemma
Loud Bars, Private Parties
Make Them Hip With Locals
But Paying Guests May Balk

By PETER SANDERS
Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
July 22, 2005; Page B1

HOLLYWOOD -- The recent $10 million makeover at the Hollywood
Roosevelt Hotel has restored it as a magnet for young scene makers,
and its poolside bar is suddenly this summer's hip place to be.

But not for Harriet Berman, a Newton, Mass., psychologist, who arrived
at the Roosevelt for her daughter's July 3 wedding -- only to learn
that she and her family weren't allowed to use the hotel pool or
poolside bar most afternoons and evenings. The hotel asked the Bermans
and other hotel guests to leave the pool area, which would be closing
almost every day for the foreseeable future to accommodate
celebrity-heavy private events complete with earpiece-wearing
bouncers.

The capper came when hotel management told the wedding party -- with
two days to go before the poolside event they had planned -- that the
ceremony would have to take place instead in the Roosevelt's dimly lit
lobby.

"They're so concerned with putting themselves on the Hollywood map
that they aren't paying any attention to what's going on inside the
hotel," Dr. Berman says. In an effort to make amends, the hotel
provided extra lighting and flowers. It waived most of the charges
above the family's deposit and threw in a complimentary stay in the
hotel penthouse for the wedding couple.

The fiasco is emblematic of the tough balancing act boutique hoteliers
are trying to perform: establish local buzz without alienating the
actual paying customers. "You need to care about the guest experience
and make sure they're not excluded from whatever party scene you
design," says Ira Drukier, a partner in New York's Mercer Hotel.
"Making it simply a party scene with two or three DJs can be done --
but how does that work towards a hotel experience, other than making
it a public-relations element?" (The Mercer itself made headlines last
month when actor Russell Crowe allegedly threw a telephone at a
concierge after having difficulty making an international call.)

The lively scene around the pool at Hollywood's renovated Roosevelt
Hotel has created buzz but turned off some guests, who complain about
being excluded from the private parties.

Complete text:
http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB1...592703,00.html

Personally, I think the downtown standard (much cooler than the Sunset location imo) could be a good bet because and it isn't super expensive, and tmk hotel guests always get access to the rooftop, no matter who's in town.