Results tagged “hotel”

There was never going to be a real winner in the Kirsten Dunst vs. alleged burglar case. Either millionaire starlet Dunst was going to send someone to jail for 15 years for stealing a purse, or a thief was going to get off with a slap on the wrist. The NY Post is now reporting that 35-year-old Jim Jimenez has been acquitted after playing what they call an "I'm too stupid" card; reportedly submitting letters and grades from his former Special Ed program that backed him up.

With their usual smorgasbord of awful, breakfast-related puns, the Post is reporting (with a "It's scam and eggs" headline) on an expensive scam that went on at the Belvedere Hotel on West 48th Street. Mary Comis, the 62-year-old controller of the hotel amassed $208,000 over three years by scamming patrons through the hotel's breakfast specials. The hotel had two specials for guests: The American Breakfast priced at $19.95, and a Continental Breakfast at $13.95. While calculating the large breakfast totals, Comis would charge the $6 difference to herself, meaning "she would have had to pull the scam roughly 34,699 times." The amounts she charged were so small that nobody caught on until recently. She's expected to serve 300 hours of community service, and is currently paying all of the money back to the Belvedere. Too bad, otherwise it would have been a parfait crime. (Your move, Post.)

The naked truth about the Standard Hotel originally broke on Curbed in early July, and now it's made it all the way to the desk of Brian Williams after getting daily coverage in the New York papers this week.

Jeffrey and Michelle Feig's charming Central Park West apartment has gone from urban oasis to noisy nightmare, and someone's got to pay. In a $4.5 million lawsuit filed in Manhattan Supreme Court, the Feigs accuse the neighbor, Michel Kadoe, of turning his backyard into a "shantytown," by renting out the garden apartment in his brownstone to unruly tourists.

The Post is ready for its readers to be outraged with an "Exclusive" on how some people abuse 911, the city ambulances and emergency rooms. Example one is "Ricky Alardo, a homeless alcoholic nicknamed Ricky Ricardo" who "swigs cheap vodka by day at his favorite corner in Washington Heights, then calls an ambulance to chauffeur him to the hospital for a free meal and a warm place to sleep, courtesy of taxpayers who fund his Medicaid benefits." (More details here.) He calls 911 "four or five times a week," which works out to $300,000 a year—or $3.9 million over the 13 years he's been running the scam. Alardo proudly says the medics "treat me like a king"—the Post explains,"By law, EMS workers cannot refuse to treat or transport any patient. And ERs have to at least evaluate and stabilize homeless patients." One medic said, "It's not always easy to pick up these guys and take them in. But our policy is: 'You call, we haul.' We have no other choice," while another admits, "When Ricky passes on, I'll probably even go to his funeral. I've seen him almost every day for the last 13 years."

She's going to be a resident of NYC soon, after all. Okay, so at the end of June there was a blind item that screamed C. Lo, it read: "Although she claims to be clean, when she checked out of a Manhattan hotel recently, the maid found the room littered with dirty needles." Now the NY Post confirms it, reporting that it took Courtney Love no time at all to trash her posh room at The Inn on Irving Place.

              

We haven't tried the food yet, but The Standard Grill—the new restaurant that officially opened last week on the ground floor of The Standard Hotel—seems to have a lot going for it. Besides being really ridiculously good looking, the joint's timing and location are prime indeed, coinciding with the first section of the High Line park to open to the public. The restaurant, designed by Roman and Williams, is comprised of three distinct spaces: an outdoor dining section, a sun-soaked bistro with tiled floor and a full bar, and a white-tablecloth, fine dining room with red banquettes and orange leather armchairs.

We've got to admit, when we heard that residents near the Thomspon LES Hotel were vehemently complaining about the noise from the hotel's new rooftop patios, we wondered if maybe they weren't overreacting just a tiny bit, considering that they choose to live in a part of Manhattan not exactly known as an oasis of tranquility. But good grief, check out this recent Thompson LES pool party, documented by a neighbor who should be credited for shooting video, not bullets.

Over a dozen local residents who live (if you can call it that!) near the Thompson LES Hotel on Allen Street showed up at a Community Board 3 meeting last night to complain about traffic congestion, rowdy tools crowding their sidewalks, and noise noise NOISE echoing up into their windows from the newly-opened third floor rooftop pool bar. (Which, it should be noted, is open only to hotel guests—or anyone who gets a bite to eat at the hotel restaurant Shang!) How obstreperous are those bastards drinking and swimming and digesting Susur Lee's lamb chops? Well, one neighbor says their opening parties were so loud she couldn't hear her TV. Clearly, this monstrosity must be razed or urinated on at once.

Free chocolates and Atlantic City hotel reservations are being handed out at the corner of 48th Street and Sixth Avenue until 10 a.m. this morning, and then from 12 p.m. to 1 p.m. at the Jacques Torres Hudson Store (350 Hudson). The hotel is Harrah's, and we're told they're distributing 5,000 free overnight stays to publicize the Sunday opening of a café called Temptations that will feature most of the Jacques Torres product line. (Torres has been answering NY Times readers' questions this week, and has revealed the secret to his dangerously addictive chocolate chip cookies.) In other V-Day gimmicks, three couples will be competing in the Netflix "Greatest Kiss" contest at Grand Central this morning. On sets built to resemble the movies, they'll be performing kiss-culminating scenes from Titanic, Gone With the Wind, and the incestuous mom/son kiss from Back to the Future. We're told a panel of judges will rate the "amateur kissers," and the awkwardness begins at 11:30.

           

Look out Standard, the Ace Hotel is here! Last summer renderings of the establishment's interior began to circulate, as well as some more details about what the chain would bring to New York (they currently have outposts in Seattle, Portland and Palm Springs). Today we stopped by for a sneak peek inside the still unfinished hotel, located at 29th and Broadway. The room we saw had all the fun details the Ace is known for, and rumor has it that long ago the longest ever boxing match happened in the basement of the building, which is why the hotel made the bath robes look like boxing robes!

John Deutzman over at My Fox NY is on the warpath over illegal hotels in the city, specifically the Marrakech, the Broadway Hotel and the Royal Park Hotel, which rent rooms to tourists but refuse to accept guests from New York. Why? Because these Upper West Side buildings, all owned by one Hank Freid, are actually zoned as permanent occupancy residential buildings, and Freid doesn't want any locals moving in and demanding a lease. After all, he already has to put up with guys like Franco Medina, a resident of the Royal Park for the past 32 years, who sheepishly admits to paying just $252 a month, while tourists pay as much as $260 a night.

One of NYC's most famous buildings may be turned into a hotel: According to the Daily News, Italian real estate group Sorgente "has bought just over 50% of the iconic structure and plans to keep buying more." It's believe their portion of the building is worth $190 million.

          

The first NYC location of The Standard Hotel opened recently after more than two years of construction; located literally above the High Line, this is the sort of ominous looking structure that Curbed once likened to the AT-AT All-Terrain Walker from Star Wars. (Or for the more adult-minded, a "perpetual lap dancer" on the High Line, because of the way it evocatively straddles that old elevated railway.)

While nothing will ever beat the Braniff Airlines commercials that Andy Warhol appeared in (video), a new clip of the artist is making its way around the internet this week. Here he is with Steven Spielberg, Bianca Jagger and a broken television (not shown: the cocktail of drugs that had to be consumed prior to this).

                  

Earlier this year it was announced that a Hamptons for Hipsters was about to take shape in Atlantic City, courtesy of the Beatrice Inn boys Paul Sevigny and Matt Abramcyk. The two have taken their aesthetic and transferred it over to The Chelsea's 5th floor, which houses a game room, several lounges, a pool, patios and a restaurant. But you know what they say: you can't take the New Jersey out of Atlantic City.

       

The revolving hotel room that's part of theanyspacewhatever exhibit at the Guggenheim isn't the only noteworthy work on view at the moment; through January the museum is hosting a mid-career survey of Catherine Opie, who's known for her striking photographs of diverse subjects ranging from Minnesota ice fishers to the west coast L.G.B.T. community.

    

Originally designed by Plaza Hotel architect Henry Hardenbergh in 1907 as a men’s bar, The Oak Room closed during Prohibition and re-opened in 1934 as a full-service restaurant. The interior is a city Landmark, as is the Plaza Hotel, which reopened in March (after extensive renovations) as a hotel and luxury condominium, where some tenants complain of loneliness. The Palm Court, that other famous eatery in The Plaza, also reopened in March to derisive reviews from Bloomberg News and the Post.

Who knew the word "plaza" would come to be so coveted? After a three week trial, a jury has ruled that the low-budget downtown Vegas Plaza Hotel and Casino has not adequately protected its trademark, clearing the way for the El-Ad Group, the owners of the Plaza Hotel in New York, to build a $5 billion, seven-tower, 6,700-unit "Plaza Hotel and Casino" on the Strip. The jury ruled that the Vegas Plaza had simply gone by too many names over the years, including the Union Plaza and Jackie Gaughan’s Plaza Downtown. A lawyer for the Vegas owners tells the Times, "We’re somewhat stunned and in disbelief." And with good reason; is El-Ad seriously going to roll the dice on a multi-billion dollar hotel resort hotel development at this particular time?

   

A small hotel chain that got some ink spilled about it last year in The NY Times, The Ace Hotel, will now bring its charm to New York. They're currently setting up shop at 29th and Broadway, and bringing a Stumptown Coffee (a favorite amongst Pacific Northwesters) with it. The grand opening will be in Winter 08/09, and it will come with a new restaurant from the people behind The Spotted Pig. The Ace tell us a little bit about what to expect:

Ace is the low card and the high card. Our basic rooms are affordable but replete with cool amenities. Our big suites offer all the luxury you would expect from a high-end hotel. Ace Hotel New York is improvisational, a mix of styles, historical periods and objects that come together in layers. The hotel’s design takes its cues from the vibrancy of street life, the honesty of materials and the potential of invention. It is about soul, latent in the old architecture and re-introduced through the new design.

Inexpensive lodging has finally come to the West Village; The NY Times reports on 113 Jane Street's latest incarnation: The Jane, which is offering up rooms for under 100 bucks.

   

Those retro TV dinners with the pre-formulated portions aren’t just for Eisenhower-era loners anymore; the factory-made frozen meals have been cleverly revived for big city sophisticates dining at the Regency Hotel's 540 Park restaurant. The first Swanson TV Brand Frozen Dinner sold for 98 cents in 1953; at the Regency it’s been brought up to date for $30.

Also for the Times, Peter Meehan highlights two of his favorite East Village haunts: Punjab and Polish G. I. Delicatessen. Punjab’s the beloved little hole in the wall on First Street near Avenue A that dishes out some the best cheap vegetarian food around; Meehan correctly asserts that the 24-hour institution is “as good at breakfast as it is after stumbling out of a show at the Mercury Lounge across the street.”

A 27-year-old rookie police officer turned a drunken assignation into a felony rape charge earlier this week. Kevin Johnson allegedly met a number of women at a midtown bar Monday night and accompanied them back to the Gershwin Hotel, where the women were staying on East 27th St. They were visiting New York for a hairdressers convention, and Johnson reportedly had consensual sex with one of them.

Today Frank Bruni reviews Adour (pictured), the four-month-old St. Regis Hotel restaurant conceived by extravagant French chef Alain Ducasse. While it’s not “rapturous” enough to merit the Times’s highest four star rating, it’s still “first-rate: polished service, a knockout wine list, beautiful oil-poached cod, gorgeous roasted lamb and exquisite desserts.” And Bruni does confirm our earlier speculation about some kind of haute bagel on the menu.

Many have characterized New York City's real estate boom as insane, and this latest chapter adheres to that theme. The imposing and occasionally frightening-looking Bellevue Psychiatric Hospital on Manhattan's 1st Ave. may be transformed into a luxury hotel.

Brownstoner has done the math and concluded that there are a ridiculous number of hotels going up near Brooklyn’s lovely Gowanus Canal. The latest new development will be a nine story Fairfield Inn on Third Avenue between Douglass and Butler streets; construction will begin once existing buildings are torn down. So that makes a future grand total of 7 hotels in the Gowanus neighborhood; three already built and four more on the way.

Hotelier Jason Pomeranc is creating posh microcosms of gentility all over the city. Since his luxury boutique hotel brand launched seven years ago with the opening of 60 Thompson, Pomeranc has opened two more New York properties, 6 Columbus and Gild Hall. Now, everybody's wondering when his next venture, Thompson LES, at 200 Allen Street will swing open its doors to what The Observer says has become "a no-man’s land of rats, dirty streets and prolonged high-rise construction projects."

A do-it-herself cosmetic unprofessional is promising women butts that look like J. Lo's, but is more likely threatening her clients' lives. Earlier this week, NY Post reported an Atlanta woman who concocted her own fly-in fly-out business, charging woman thousands of dollars for what could be an extremely dangerous and disfiguring procedure.

Earlier this month, Sarah Lewitinn (Ultragrrrl) brought her label, Stolen Transmission, back to the bedroom after leaving Island/Def Jam. This was just one of many things that signaled more changes for the major, and now it turns out that the president of Def Jam, Jay-Z, is stepping down from his position. The NY Times reports:

Jay-Z made the announcement with Def Jam’s parent, Universal Music Group, as his employment contract was expiring. Under a separate long-term recording contract with Def Jam, Jay-Z, whose real name is Shawn Carter, still owes the company one or more albums.