:D

BTW: Is it easy (regarding availability) to use suite upgrade awards at PH? What do they grant under this?

Some have gotten Westside Suites, but YMMV. Park Suite at least.

In other news: I have heard wonderful things about FS Downtown... Peter and Thomas seem to have picked a wonderful team!

Both good news:)

Crosby Street concierge is possibly the most useless concierge I've ever used in my life. Trying to get them to book a restaurant for me and my friends for a special occasion - might as well set a calendar reminder for when bookings open and do it myself! Painfully useless.

Hi all, looking for some NY luxury hotel advice, please.

We're a family of 3 (me, husband, 5 year old daughter) flying in from Toronto to NY in mid-Feb to see The Sleeping Beauty at the Koch Theater. Staying for 3 nights. Considering the Pierre, the Park Hyatt, the Peninsula, and the St. Regis. Open to other suggestions, based on our wants list:

1. Friendly, attentive service. Non-stuffy, warm, hospitable, small kid-friendly.
2. Near Central Park.
3. Adjoining rooms (we'd leave the connecting door open, but we'd like our daughter to have her own room)
4. Not tourist central (we've stayed at the Plaza in the past)

Would be nice but not 100% necessary:

1. A pool.
2. A car that could ferry us over to the theater.
3. Afternoon tea.

We are in our 40s, my husband has very long hair and is in the music business (I say this because it's given some staff pause in the past and I hate that) and we'd like to be in at around $1.5K USD a night. Thanks in advance for any/all help. :)

If you can live without the pool & house car sugarmagnolia The Lowell still has a wonderful afternoon tea on the 2nd floor, but then again a 5 year old might prefer tea at the American Girl store

MONY

My husband has stayed at the MO and wasn't overwhelmed with the service aspect. I will look into the Lowell, thank you!

Out of the ones I've listed (Pen, Pierre, St. Regis, PH) which would you choose for us?

MONY service can be patchy , our last stay was ok .
The apple tart at the bar was superb . Service depended on who was working .
Think some :confused: staff .
Housekeeping too . Or OTT :)

Great pool though .

If you have points PH , if not Pierre or Pen .

Unless something recently changed, the suite upgrades at the Park Hyatt used to only confirm into the Junior Suite.

FYI The Whitby is now taking reservations. There aren't many photos on the website yet but the room descriptions sound similar to The Crosby, albeit with a small number of terrace suites.

Rates are similar to Crosby also, just slightly higher for certain room types ($695 for entry level room, $1100 for Junior Suite, etc).

I'm really liking the Baccarat these days. Have had really good feedback from clients...couples and families. Also, it's just so gorgeous vs. so many other dated/old heros in town.

Never heard of it. It looks very very nice. Thanks for the info.

St. Regis may be a good bet. New rooms with good connecting room options, and a very decent afternoon tea and they're great with kids. Plus, if you can time it properly, you could get the Bentley transfer and arrive at the theater in style.

Was PR in charge of renovations at St Regis NY? The Bentley Suite, The Dior Suite, The Tiffany's Suite... ghastly. With so many new hotel developments now, StR should not rest on its laurels of the past.

starwood(marriott) still owns st regis new york
sheraton originally bought it back in 1966
starwood recently sold st regis rome & florence
starwood also just sold st regis san francisco

I believe those suites were redone before the rest of the hotel. I think they're all beautifully done - a nice set of choices depending on an individual's taste. I think the hotel is doing fine.

Any recent experiences at the Peninsula NYC? One of my friends came to me for help booking a hotel for him and his girlfriend in NYC. I managed to find a pretty incredible rate ($325/night on hotwire when all other websites were selling for $800/night) so we jumped on it straight away. Now just a bit worried since tripadvisor reviews seem a bit mixed. I don't really trust tripadvisor too much and really value the opinions of FT members a lot higher. I just hope there wouldn't be anywhere else where they could have got a better experience for a similar price. I did notice that the Langham was a similar price and the Conrad was about 70% the price but from my own experiences (albeit all in Asia) I would expect Peninsula to be a higher class of hotel.

$325 per night through a wholesaler is pretty incredible. The hotel is quite nice. My only concern would be that wholesaler bookings tend to get blocked in a hotel's "last sell" rooms.

This hotel gets mixed reviews on this forum. I personally like it at Jr. Suite level and higher. But at $325 per night, I would say by all means go for it. Even if you get their least desirable room, you're still at the Peninsula New York for little more than you would pay for a dump. Even big box chain/convention hotels in this city often have higher rates.

Even in this hotel's most basic room, you'll have a very comfortable bed, good water pressure, the Peninsula in room technology suite, and Peninsula service. What more could one possibly expect for $325/night in a prime location on Fifth Avenue in Midtown Manhattan?

Also, if you are not happy with the room you are offered, you could ask about paid upsell to a higher category, and possibly end up with a more spacious room still for substantially less than published rates.

At this price you can´t do much wrong. I never stayed at the Pen as I always preferred other hotels, but I also never paid 325 €;)

It's also only USD $325, which amazingly now is about €308...

(Note to self: book FS George V for next trip to Paris;))

Uuups... Yes, it´s amzing! Was 195 € few years ago. Can´t afford holidays in the US anymore:eek:

Of course it depends on whether one's income is derived from USD or EUR... ;)

It is unfortunately bad news for EUR earners, particularly as many resorts world wide are priced in USD.

It's been a long time since I have done any shopping in EUR, as it for a very long time was much more expensive for me due to the weak dollar.

I suppose it is some consolation that the value of EUR remains slightly higer than USD, so while USD travel is less of a bargain it's still not bad...

Thanks for all the replies! I thought it was a pretty good deal so I'm glad you all agree!!

Crosby Street Hotel
 

Thought I'd share a few notes re my stay at Crosby Street Hotel last month.

Love the location – great spot in Soho just near Balthazar. Subway is very close if that is your thing. Shopping is great in Soho. Do make a trip to Jeffrey in Chelsea though if luxury fashion is your thing – their buyer is great. If booking Ubers, check your app to make sure if the car arrives on Crosby side or on Lafayette.

We booked a Luxury Room and received upgrade at time of booking to Deluxe Room (ended up allocated on 7th floor). Other benefits included in rate were full breakfast and champagne on arrival. We also received some cakes and a bottle of their lavender room/linen spray.

We arrived early (around lunch) and were taken to the guest only lounge for check-in and given a drink while they finished preparing our room. It was around a 20 minute wait which was fine. They actually did ask non-guests to leave this lounge a couple of times.

Room was nice. We were allocated I think on the 7th (maybe 8th) floor, looking out across the rooftops Crosby Street direction. We were close to the lift which I don’t usually like (because of noise), but the rooms are well soundproofed and I was not disturbed. Our room was a fine size (we had carryon size luggage only) for a few nights. Bathroom was shower only, but I really liked it. Loved the décor in the room, the warehouse-style windows especially make me feel like I’m in NYC. Room was always kept very clean and turn down was as expected.

Breakfast was great. I really enjoyed our mornings here. We were in town for fashion week so hosted some guests for breakfast before some shows. We asked what the situation was with breakfast and we were told to order what we wanted as full breakfast was included in our rate. Turns out this included our guests too so this was a daily saving of at least $200.

My only issue with service was in the restaurant on our first morning at breakfast. I ordered a fresh green juice and the server accepted the order (after I asked twice if it was fresh). Five minutes later she came back and said it would be a 10 minute wait as it had to be made fresh in the kitchen. Five minutes later she came back with a bottled cold press juice and asked if it was okay as this was all they had. I just took it as too much back and forth at this point. Then I asked for hot English mustard with my steak. They brought me Dijon, which I sent back. They then bought me grainy, which I sent back. Then the manager came over to see what was wrong and I asked why an English-owned hotel did not have English mustard (maybe I was still annoyed by the juice but this honestly really did baffle me). Long story short, I had to settle with Dijon. But the server (a new one now) brought grainy, which I sent back. I finally got Dijon mustard and at this point I wasn’t very happy and expressed this. I also asked if they thought it was appropriate at this kind of property to serve bottled juice. The manager then said he would get a fresh green juice made for me. Within five minutes I had my juice (it was incredible actually) and was told for my following mornings to just mention that the manager has arranged my juice and the server will know. Well, that didn’t happen the next morning and I had the same discussion with a new server before I asked for the manager and then the correct juice came.

A bit long winded, and almost as fickle as when I commented here on someone waiting 30 minutes (was it more?) for someone to draw them a bath, but I feel this was actually a service issue. Every other interaction with staff was fine – requests for items met quickly, room service delivered promptly one day when we wanted a snack due to an early start (this was comp too even though we came back to the hotel after a fitting for breakfast later). I did not use concierge as they proved useless prior to my stay at confirming restaurant reservations.

To end, very, very much enjoyed the Crosby overall and will definitely be back. Maybe it is just my demographic and interests, but I really cannot fathom why anyone would stay any further uptown. We went to a party at The Edition (Madison Square Park) and it just felt so removed from anywhere I find enjoyable about being in New York. I didn’t really enjoy shopping uptown either.

As an additional, non-hotel related note, nicer places I dined were Carbone, Mercer Kitchen, The Polo Bar, The Bowery and Lafayette (and a few others, but they mustn’t have impressed). Enjoyed them all, especially Carbone – really recommend this (although they did let three Middle Eastern guys take over the section of the restaurant you can hire exclusively for around $6k, staff stood at the entry to this section to escort guests to the restrooms, and the guys were clearly smoking inside, we had all our deserts and a bottle of champagne comp’d when I complained about the smell…). Mercer Kitchen was a bit of a circus. Also went to a place called Once Upon A Tart on Sullivan and Prince – really enjoyed this for breakfast the few nights we stayed at a friend’s apartment.

(I tried to attach a couple of pics of the room)

Fantastic! As someone who lived in NYC, and returns somewhat regularly, if we don't feel like bothering friends/family, I've added this to the list.

I agree; much above 14th does not interest me, but I get why tourists want to stay near the park.

Great review. This hotel has been on my radar. On another note, is there a luxury-lite hotel (we're going with friends and I would like to stay around $400 a night, given that our friends want to keep it at $300...) that's south of midtown and has rooms large enough for a kid or two? Obviously Crosby is too expensive for this trip.

I've seen The Langham Place in that price range. Depends a bit on your dates, but it is doable. Excellent choice for value by the way, considering the entry level rooms are 420ft²/40sqm²! Sadly it is Midtown and not really South of Midtown.

How about the Edition. LM225 did a review recently and it's got a Madison Park location. Virtuoso as well and often has 3for2 promos...

FDW

AFAIK, no rooms with double beds, which at least rules it out for me when traveling with family.

St. Regis New York
 

Has anyone here had the chance to stay in any of the top suites (the kind that are usually not bookable online) at any of the luxury hotels in New York?

What were you experiences like? Did you get upgraded (perhaps due to hotel status / Amex FHR / Virtuoso / birthday/anniversary)? Or were you able to get a good rate (reasonable price yet still expensive)?

During one of my stays at the St. Regis New York, I stayed in their Bentley Suite (one of their five Designer Suites).

The following is a video I took of the suite during my stay.

Impressive concierge team at StR New York
 

So the StR NY team had 4 people on different computers at 8:59 am EST to get us a reservation at Eleven Madison Park for our stay in March—despite that not being a normal reservation for which concierges usually assist at any top hotels due to the Tock online reservation system. And they got us the reservation, sparing me the need to wake up at 5:59 am PST.

I'm curious - did you have to push the concierge to help you out with making the reservation on Tock, or were they willing from the get-go? And if the latter, how much of that is related to Plat100, do you think? Like you, I'm surprised they were willing to help out with this given what is I am sure a large number of requests for EMP. All the more better to you for getting them to do it!

Enjoy EMP - not sure if you have been before but it goes down as one of the best dining experiences of my life, and this is coming from someone who typically finds everything overrated!

Funny with the jacket..... Personally I have no problem with it especially as this "jacket required" policy is far from what I understand under elegant clothes as you can wear some trousers with a shirt and jacket (any one?!) and not even a tie. But I´m also like my personal freedom and hates when getting dictated a dress code. I´m even some Kind of offended as it gives the Impression that they think I´m not able to choose appropriate clothes. But that´s an Special Thing in my eyes. During my visits in the U.S. I got the Impression that especially there People like to get dress codes. It´s getting more and more popular in Europe what is a terrible:
But back to topic: The service level sounds exceptional if due to the general class of StR or Plat100. I was a little bit angry at MO that they weren´t able to get me a table at Per Se for dinner.

Going up next week...seem to always miss timing it with you :)

Was trying to get a table at Eleven Mad, concierge at Baccarat couldn't get us in. But in their defense, I only gave a week's notice, an impossible task.

Would be interested in a Review about Baccarat;)

I've been saying the same and no one has! Thus, I'm heading up to conduct my own independent research :)

Will be sure to report back to all. Cheers!

Everything is pretty insanely priced for a quick trip in April. Debating on biting the bullet and paying near $1,100 per night or just staying at a mid tier place.