Terry Trucco

The Revamped Hotel Chelsea’s Reverse Makeover On Screen In “A Complete Unknown”

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Hotels don’t win Oscars, but that doesn’t mean they don’t make cameo appearances in movies tapped for Academy Awards. Almost every year, a movie with a scene or two set in a New York City hotel racks up a fistful of nominations or even strikes gold. See Scent of a Woman (filmed at the Waldorf Astoria and the Plaza), Godfather III (filmed at the Waldorf) and Wolf of Wall Street (filmed at the Four Seasons New York).

This year, A Complete Unknown, the history-steeped film that tracks Bob Dylan’s early career, gifted the legendary Hotel Chelsea with a whiff of Oscar magic.  Just a whiff, it turns out. Despite eight nominations, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actor, the movie went home empty handed on March 2. Read more

Terry Trucco

8 NYC Hotels with Great Views for Watching Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade

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Where do you want to be when Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade marches through New York City?

Hotel rooms with parade views (and room service breakfasts) offer a serene (and weatherproof) alternative to a sidewalk teeming with humanity. This year, the parade will march from Central Park West to Central Park South and down Sixth Avenue (aka Avenue of the Americas) to the Macy’s Herald Square mother ship. That means eight hotel are ideally situated to serve up rooms with the view you want.

Booking a parade-view room comes with a unique set of rules. Call the hotel directly (don’t even think about reserving online). Expect holiday pricing (the cheapest start at around $500 a night) and a three-night minimum. Another holiday quirk: the parade is meant to be seen from the street, so rooms on lower floors are the most desirable. Just because a hotel faces Sixth Avenue doesn’t mean Beagle Scout Snoopy and newcomer Minnie Mouse will be visible from every window. Read more

Terry Trucco

How Did an Iconic Waldorf Astoria Statue Wind Up in a Village in Iceland?

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In 2017, the Waldorf Astoria closed its mighty doors and hunkered down for a much-needed renovation that would transform the storied-but-outdated, 1,421-room property into a sybaritic, 375-room hotel paired with 375 high-end condominiums. The $1 billion makeover was expected to take two or three years to complete. 

Six years later, the Waldorf is still shuttered and isn’t expected to reopen until the end of 2024, or so they say. But that hasn’t prevented iconic Waldorf treasures from popping up off campus. In 2020, the Lobby Clock, a triumph of Victorian technology, craftsmanship and overkill, went on view at the New-York Historical Society, fresh from a top-to-toe restoration.

And this summer, “Spirit of Achievement,” the soaring winged sculpture that once stood guard above the Waldorf’s Park Avenue entrance, turned up on a brand-new pedestal in Hvolsvöllur, a tiny town of 950 people in Iceland.

How in the world did a Waldorf showpiece wind up in a remote Nordic village? 

Read more

Terry Trucco

The Carlyle’s Star Turn (Sort Of) In “Tár”

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Ever since Week-End at the Waldorf, a remake of 1932’s Grand Hotel that danced across theater screens in 1945, New York City hotels have played silent but memorable supporting roles in dozens of movies. Some, like Godfather III (filmed at the Waldorf Astoria), Scent of a Woman (filmed at the Waldorf and the Plaza) and Quiz Show (filmed at The Roosevelt), have scooped up Academy Awards or nominations.

This year, one New York City hotel got an Oscar nod, sort of. Though Tár didn’t take home any of the six awards it was nominated for, including Best Picture, Best Director and Best Actress, it did offer hotel buffs a glimpse of what appears to be Carlyle Hotel. Read more

Terry Trucco

The Surprising Way Hotels Facilitated The Art of Edward Hopper

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Edward Hopper’s lifelong obsession with New York City is well known as is his fascination with urban landscapes, peering into private rooms and the loneliness and isolation a teeming metropolis can breed.

Hotels embody all of the above, so it’s surprising in a way that he didn’t draw inspiration from them as he did from apartment buildings, restaurants and theaters.

But hotels facilitated a small but intriguing slice of the celebrated 20th-century artist’s work, as the Edward Hopper’s New York, on view at the Whitney Museum through March 5, shows. They helped him pay his bills and captured his interest early in his career, if only for mercenary reasons. And that’s more than enough to make this satisfying exhibition catnip for art-loving hotel geeks.  Read more

Terry Trucco

The Merriest, Happiest Holiday Decorations at New York City Hotels, 2022 Edition

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If we had choose just one word to describe the 2022 holiday season in New York City, we’d go with normal. And hey, after two years of pandemic craziness, normal sounds downright scintillating.

Lighting the way towards a blissful normalcy are the city’s hotels, dressed to dazzle whether you’re checking in — 6.5 million visitors were expected between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day — or just checking them out, as we do every year. Camera in hand, we captured 11 deliciously decked halls, walls, and even sidewalks at hotels all over Manhattan — and added the city’s showpiece outdoor tree just because.

Happy Holidays! Read more

Terry Trucco

What We Loved at the 2022 Hotel Trade Fairs — And What You May See on Your Next Hotel Visit

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For hotel design enthusiasts, a high point of the year is the annual arrival of BDNY, aka Boutique Design New York, and HX: The Hotel Experience, two big trade shows that camp out for a long, late-autumn weekend at Javits Center.

It’s the ultimate preview of coming attractions for hospitality geeks, a sneak peek at what you can expect to see in hotels before too, too long, from the latest trends in floor coverings, bedding and china to the latest lighting, mini-fridges and bathroom soap dispensers.

After two show-less years (both events were cancelled in 2020, and we missed 2021), we were thrilled to be back, roaming the caverns of Javits with notebook and camera. Here’s what caught our eye. Read more

Terry Trucco

Where Did The Queen Spend The Night When She Visited New York?

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Queen Elizabeth II visited New York City three times during her 70-year reign, but she spent only one night at a New York City hotel. 

Her historic hotel stay occurred on October 21, 1957 during her first ever visit to the city. It should come as no surprise that the Queen and Prince Philip checked into the Waldorf Astoria, the mid-century, go-to hotel for presidents, potentates, popes and celebrities from A (Princess Astrid of Norway) to Z (Zsa Gabor). Read more

Terry Trucco

Sheraton New York Times Square Scores A Big Win Hosting the 2022 New York Democratic Convention

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Ready to welcome a crowd: Sheraton Metropolitan Ballroom (Sheraton New York photo)

By Terry Trucco

When the New York Democratic Convention kicks off tonight at the Sheraton New York Times Square, it will be more than a political event. It marks the return of the high-profile party convention to a New York City hotel, the first since the pandemic sidelined large gatherings in March 2020. Read more

Terry Trucco

Hotel Obits, Part II: Six Notable NYC Hotels Closed Permanently By The Pandemic

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By Terry Trucco

It was nearly two years ago that Covid muscled into New York City and shuttered more than 30 percent of the city’s 705 hotels — a significant number of them permanently.

Not every hotel that closed during the pandemic was a gem. But some are too notable to slip away without a few words of appreciation. Our first batch of hotel obituaries posted last fall with six Covid casualties we couldn’t let go without a send off.

Since then we’ve gathered a second batch — six more hotels that didn’t survive the pandemic but deserve one last look.  Read more