My spouse and I stayed at the
New York Hilton Midtown (previously called the Hilton New York) for one night
on a Saturday evening in mid-April 2018. We booked our room online using the
Hilton website. After we booked, an email offered upgraded accommodations for a
fee, which we did not accept. We also did not check in online prior to our
stay.
(Note: This hotel was
previously called the Hilton New York. It should not be confused with the
Hilton Times Square/New York City Hilton, which is located on West 42nd
Street between 7th and 8th Avenues, where we stayed in
March 2018; see our separate review.)
The New York Hilton Midtown is
located on 6th Avenue between West 53rd and 54th Streets
between the Theatre District and Central Park. The hotel seems to occupy an
entire city block, with at least five different entrances; the main entrance is
on 6th Avenue, but there is one entrance on 53rd, two on 54th,
and one sort of mid-block at the parking garage. It boasts notable guests
including hosting every president of the United States since JFK, plus Elvis in
1972 and The Beatles in 1964, being the location for the first hand-held cell
telephone call in 1973, and the place where Donald Trump made his victory
speech in 2016.
The hotel offers two bars (the
Lobby Lounge and Bridges Bar; note that the Minus 5 ice bar that opened in 2013
closed earlier this year), a grab-and-go counter-service market called Herb ‘n
Kitchen, an Executive Lounge for Hilton HHonors Gold and Diamond members, a
fitness center, and a business center. A Bluemercury beauty and spa chain is
one of the shops on the street level of the hotel, and a souvenir shop is also
available at the hotel. Service at the front desk during both check-in and
check-out was brusque and business-like, even bordering on unfriendly and
unhelpful. There is a separate line for Hilton Honors members; however, the regular
line moved much more quickly. The two lines at the Herb ‘n Kitchen were
ridiculously long whenever we passed. For example, we stood in line for more
than 20 minutes just to buy some bottled drinks. (The market is well-outfitted
and offers a wide variety of drinks, snacks, and other sundry items.) Despite
there being at least four cash registers, and about six staff members present,
they operated only two of the check-out stations. We think that if each line
contains more than 15 guests, that staff should have opened another registers
to absorb the crowd.
Note that this property
assesses a $25 per night “Urban Destination” charge that covers your internet
(which we would have received free anyway as HHonors members), a $15 credit at
either the Lobby Bar or Bridges, and a $10 credit at Herb ‘n Kitchen. If guests
are staying for multiple nights, we believe that the credits can only be used
per day; you cannot pool/accrue them to use cumulatively for one transaction at
each venue. We have recently begun to see this charge pop up on other (but not
all) New York Hilton-owned properties: our stay at the nearby Times Square
Hilton just one month earlier did not assess this charge; however, a stay at
the Doubletree Times Square in February did. The charge does not seem to be
location-based or brand-based, so we are not sure why some Manhattan hotels
charge it and others do not. The hotels charge you $25 per day, but then refund
it in the form of food and drink (for which you will surely spend more than
$25; it seems like a way to encourage guests to spend more money).
The hotel offers almost 2,000
rooms (including 47 suites) spread across 47 floors. (It is reportedly the
largest Hilton hotel in the United States.) Rooms are available in the
following categories: City Room (with one or two beds), Skyline room (with one
or two beds), Urban Room (queen, king, or two doubles), accessible rooms, and
Executive Suites (with one or two beds). Based on the map posted on the back of
our door, it looked like rooms at the end of each long hallway (numbers ending
in -08, -09, -38, and -39) are a bit larger, and rooms ending in numbers -01,
-02, and -46 are a bit smaller. We had room 3231, a double-bedded room located
toward the middle of the floor and overlooking West 53rd Street. We
generally reserve a king-bed room, but a room with two doubles was the only type
available when we checked in early on a Saturday morning.
Our room seemed large and
spacious for a city hotel room. It contained two double beds with a nightstand
between the two; the nightstand offered a clock with a place to charge a mobile
phone, although it did not fit our Samsung devices. (The nightstand also
offered charging plugs on both sides.) Note that the beds were DOUBLE beds, not
QUEEN beds. If you have a party of four adults, two adults in one DOUBLE bed
might feel a little cozy. On the other hand, the room offered plenty of space.
Opposite the beds was a long furniture piece that held the flat-screen TV and
also offered desk space (with a rolling chair) and drawer space (some of which
was taken up by the empty mini-refrigerator). A closet unit near the door
offered hanging space, extra bedding, and an iron and ironing board. A small
lounge chair, matching ottoman, and side table were positioned near the window
nook. The bathroom was a decent size, with a combination bathtub/shower,
toilet, tiny sink, and vanity. The single sink offered some counter space
around and beside it, and recessed wall shelves provided additional storage
space.
We had a good stay at the New
York Hilton Midtown; we particularly liked the size of the rooms.
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