On the wall.

What happens when a hip, budget-minded hotel decides to do a take on the classic hotel Sunday brunch?

You get Eat Yo Brunch at Yotel.

From our perch overlooking the hotel’s sprawling eating area on a recent Sunday, we sized up the food on our table and pictured the management tossing around ideas.

What’s the 21^st-century version of buffet tables lined with Eggs Benedict, carved meats and pancake soufflé in silver tureens? (more…)

Donuts — baked not fried.

One reason we like hotels is that the best are laboratories for design, jam-packed with decorating ideas you can try at home. So, of course, we love home design shows, and this is one of our favorites (full disclosure: we moderated the show’s New York Times designer seminars, but we’d be fans anyway).

This year’s Architectural Digest Home Design Show spilled into every nook and cranny of New York’s cavernous Pier 94. As always, the DIFFA by Design table settings created by a panoply of design teams were fantasy arrangements at their best. (more…)

dEmo bear.

It’s as if someone filled a room with Gummy Bears, only these are big enough to eat you instead of the other way around.

We’re talking about Bear Forest, the Spanish artist dEmo’s installation of 30 life-size bear sculptures, identical in style though not in size or color, in the LAB Gallery, the corner storefront art gallery at the Roger Smith Hotel near Grand Central Station.

Each month or so the LAB displays a new installation meant to be viewed 24/7 through the windows. Viewers can’t enter the space. But you can see the art from different angles and perspectives depending upon where you stand. (more…)

Hello, spring.

We know – winter wasn’t a big deal this year, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t ready for spring. So bring it on.

These big bouquets of lilies and blossoms come courtesy of the Barclay, or to be formal about it the Intercontinental New York Barclay, a hotel that can always be depended upon for fresh flowers in the lobby. The message? Spring’s here – we’re in the pink!

After smartphones, can smart TVs be far behind? Hyatt thinks so.

This week the company announced plans to install new televisions with internet capability in the guest rooms of its full-service hotels in the US, Canada and the Caribbean over the next two years. Compared to standard flatpanel TVs, Hyatt’s new televisions are downright brainy.

The big screen.

Fingering a TV remote or a portable keyboard, guests can use the television to access Facebook or Twitter, order room service, contact an airline, request fresh towels or view local restaurant recommendations. They can stream a movie from their Netflix account, download a document to be printed or receive a message about a business meeting in the hotel. They can also, of course, watch TV.

It sounds like the ultimate on-screen mash-up – entertainment system, concierge, front desk and business center rolled into one. And it’s added proof, as if needed, that in-room technology has muscled past mattresses and creative mini-bars as the go-to amenity for hotel chains battling to be top dog. In short, it’s good news for guests. (more…)

We love it when a New York hotel makes a cameo appearance in a novel we like.  So imagine our glee upon opening Rules of Civility, Amor Towles’ exquisitely layered portrait of strivers and high society in late 1930s Manhattan, and following the characters into not one but three hotels, all beauties.

The Depression-era novel is set more in the realm of an Americanized Nancy Mitford or Evelyn Waugh than John Steinbeck, with a silky soundtrack along the lines of Benny Goodman and Billie Holiday. So small surprise the characters meet for drinks at the King Cole Bar at the St Regis and catch a taxi in front of The Carlyle.

But those are walk-ons compared to The Plaza, where Anne Grandyn, a pivotal character, keeps a suite overlooking Central Park. (more…)

We’re with New York Governor Andrew Cuomo on this one – Jacob K. Javits Convention Center is a big, soulless barn. But once a year The New York Times Travel Show moves in for a weekend along with a big chunk of the world, and the place lights up.

With representatives from more than 70 countries and 14 states – and that’s not counting cruise ships, hotel chains and tour operators – you could travel the world without a passport this past weekend.  Here’s a small sampling of what we saw. (more…)

Why is the front desk manager at The Benjamin wearing a nightcap and terrycloth bathrobe?

He’s observing National Sleep Awareness Week, a yearly educational campaign promoting the importance of sleep. The week culminates in the worst day of the year, Sunday March 11, when Daylight Savings Time begins and we spring forward, losing a precious hour of shut-eye. (more…)

Welcome to our newest feature. Each month we’ll post the 10 top Hollywood films watched by hotel guests in New York and across the US as compiled by LodgeNet, the country’s leading provider of in-room entertainment.

Here’s how guests voted with their TV remotes (and iPod apps) in February. Note to the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences: The Descendants cleaned up big with hotel guests. (more…)

First, a word about the name. Even with “south” tacked on, associating a hotel on West 35^th Street with Times Square is a stretch, especially a hotel situated between 8^th and 9^th avenues. But once you accept that TRYP is a lot closer to Madison Square Garden and Macy’s than to where the New Year’s Eve ball drops, things get interesting.

TRYP’s lobby.

Billeted in a 14-story yellow brick office building from 1925 the hotel, which opened in early February, has character. (Peek behind the metal TRYP sign, and you’ll spot the words Rose Building carved above the entrance.)

It’s moderately priced. Rooms start at $229 for now, and they’re bigger than closets, which makes up for TRYP’s west-of-the-thick-of-things location on a ho-hum block (warehouses, offices buildings and a police precinct next door).

You’ll also rack up Wyndham points if you stay, thanks to the hotel group’s acquisition of TRYP, a mid-price hotel chain that originated in Barcelona and specializes in urban properties (Madrid, Paris, Lisbon, Frankfurt and Buenos Aires, to name a few). TRYP Times Square is the group’s first US venture. Expect more.

TRYP isn’t one of those fey boutique hotels that makes you hunt down its name. This is a hotel with nothing to hide.  TRYP’s royal blue sign stands out like a beacon. And the entire ground floor – lobby, check-in, restaurant and bar – is on display through a wall of windows. (more…)