Terry Trucco

Why Do the Construction Gods Seem to Hate Le Parker Meridien?

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The Knave cafe — closed again until further notice.

Earlier this year Le Parker Meridien was forced to close its stylish Knave café for a month.  A freak accident at a construction site next door broke a wall and soaked the floor with liquid concrete, startling early morning guests sipping espressos and nibbling croissants.

Yesterday the hotel was once again a casualty of a construction mishap at another building. (Hurricane Sandy had a hand in this one.) Read more

Terry Trucco

Scary Sandy, the Hurricane Horror, Checks In and NYC Hotels Hunker Down

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Not tonight: the Ritz Carlton closed temporarily by Hurricane Sandy.

A hotel with room service, 24-hour movies, a big soaking tub and a comfy lobby lounge doesn’t strike us as a bad place to be in a storm. “I’ll watch the hurricane through my hotel room hot tub window,” writes a guest at The Out/NYC on the Hotelchatter website.

Still, Scary Sandy, or #sandynyc if you’re following Twitter, is doing what hurricanes do Read more

Terry Trucco

The Pierre’s Sirio Ristorante Throws Open its Doors with a Big Party

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Party in the ballroom.

Bill Cunningham, sporting his signature blue jacket, strode in just ahead of me, a Nikon slung around his neck. Proof positive that there was to be no shortage of social glitter at the launch party for Sirio Maccioni’s new Sirio Ristorante at The Pierre last night. Read more

Terry Trucco

High-Fiving The Plaza’s Peek-a-Boo Palm

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As advertised: they really do have palms at The Plaza’s Palm Court. We spotted this one today, peeking out between closed French doors. It reminded us of a certain scene in Sixteen Candles. But it could just as easily be a palm’s version of a high-five.

 

 

 

Terry Trucco

Feed Me: Michelin and Zagat Pick Their Top Hotel Restaurants for 2013

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October isn’t normally thought of as the start of a new year – unless you’re publishing a restaurant guide. This month biggies Michelin and Zagat unveiled their 2013 guides to New York City restaurants. As always, we snapped up copies (yes, we still like paper guides).

How did New York’s hotel restaurants fare? Read more

Terry Trucco

In the Pink — Afternoon Tea at the Peninsula that Salutes Breast Cancer Awareness Month

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From the NFL, whose big bruisers sport pink cleats to the comic strip artists who added pink ribbons to their strips, the color of Breast Cancer Awareness Month pops up a lot in October.

So why not at a hotel? Read more

Terry Trucco

Pass the Popcorn: The Ten Most Watched Movies in Hotel Rooms in September 2012

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No surprise Arbitrage was a hit with New York hotel viewers last month. The sleek financial thriller set in Bernie Madoff’s pre-incarceration Manhattan features lavish footage of two New York City hotels, The Pierre and The Plaza and a big kiss to The Sherry-Netherland.

Elsewhere in hotel rooms around the nation and Canada Arbitrage came in fourth (Marvel’s The Avengers is uber-resilient). Here’s the complete list, as always provided by LodgeNet, suppliers of in-room entertainment to 1.6 million hotel rooms in the U.S. and Canada. Read more

Terry Trucco

Sipping a Drink and Gazing at the Empire State Building at Pod 39’s Cool Roof Bar

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We’ll venture a wild guess that architect Arthur Loomis Harmon never dreamed the roof of Allerton House, a residential hotel for men he designed in 1916, would one day serve up Mexican beer, California Cabernet and cocktails like Fly By Night (gin, lemon juice, cinnamon-vanilla bean, orange blossom and sea salt on the rocks). Read more

Terry Trucco

Upbeat and Basic, Le Parker Meridien’s Burger Joint Turns Ten

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Cooked to order.

Long before Shake Shack – and the $32 Daniel Boulud truffle burger – there was Burger Joint, the hole-in-the-wall hamburger heaven tucked behind a velvet curtain in a corner of Le Parker Meridien.  This week it celebrates its tenth birthday. Read more

Terry Trucco

Lindsay Lohan’s Wild Morning at W Union Square

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The grand staircase.

It’s publicity. And it’s free. But do hotels really want to be splashed on newspaper front pages? The famous guest grabbing the attention is rarely raving about the service. Consider Dominique Strauss-Kahn and the Sofitel New York. And today Lindsay Lohan and the W Union Square.
Read more