• Stylish rooms, great service and one of Manhattan’s most sought after bistros.
• Sitting between Times Square and 5th Avenue, 44th Street’s midtown location puts you in easy walking distance of Grand Central Terminal, 5th Avenue shopping, the Rockefeller centre, Bryant Park and the Public Library.
The Whole Story
First-time hotelier Jeff Klein recognized that important as beautiful and interesting rooms are, it's also nice when the hotel restaurant is acclaimed for its food and the staff for their service. When you go downstairs to dine in the City Club's restaurant, DB Bistro Moderne, you'll experience some of the best cuisine available in Manhattan right now.
Daniel Boulud is New York's equivalent of a starred Michelin chef, and the nightly scramble for tables is typically New York: frantic and insistent. Of all the dishes, the signature DB burger is the one to have, a generous flying saucer of prime ground beef filled with a center of foie gras. How American, how New York, how decadent. Better still, this sought-after restaurant is the same kitchen that provides room service. The ultimate in up-to-the-minute Manhattan decadence is to borrow one of City Club's vast collection of DVDs, plop back on your Frette linen-covered down pillows and order the DB burger from room service. To round it out, be sure to book one of the duplex suites with a living room on one floor and a bedroom on the next, below an ornate, late-Victorian wedding cake of a ceiling. The two levels are connected by a winding staircase reminiscent of the spiral stairs designed by Le Corbusier for the Comte de Beistegui in Pariss With extraordinary classic windows reaching the full two stories, these have to be the most glamorous hotel rooms in New York. City Club is not a big hotel, but it is large in ambition. Jeff Klein intended to make this the best individual hotel in New York, and as such he pulled no punches. He hired interior designer Jeffrey Bilhuber, who has also worked for David Bowie and Anna Wintour, and commissioned artworks from some of the biggest creative names in New York.
The Harvard Club, the New York Yacht Club, the Penn Club ... the City Club Hotel is located near some of the most famous historic clubs in Manhattan. Proprietor Jeff Klein`s mission, when he acquired this property, was to recreate the ambience, the architecture, the style and the atmosphere of what used to be the enclave of New York City`s political elite. The building had good bones: it was once the clubhouse of the City Club of New York, a non-partisan civic association formed in the late 1800s to promote good government. Located on West 44th Street, a stretch of Manhattan that in the early twentieth century was being billed as New York`s answer to Pall Mall, the club had a library, a café, a billiard room, a reading room and a dining room, as well as four floors of guest rooms, each with private tub and shower. It was a club on a par with the other fashionable clubs, but sadly the building was sold in 1939. It subsequently suffered the fate of many grand Midtown structures: it became an office building. In 1999 it was purchased by City Club Hotel (no relation to the club of the same name) and the job commenced to restore a club-like feeling to this stately building. Jeffrey Bilhuber, a designer whose projects include homes for Anna Wintour, Michael Douglas and David Bowie, was brought in to realize Jeff Klein`s clearly defined ambition of creating a personal space for sophisticated and discerning guests. Choosing timelessness over invention, the designer opted for a palate of materials such as Honduras mahogany, waxed cork flooring, hand-drawn wallpaper, polished bronze, matte limestone and the odd splash of cashmere and faux fur. Rich, seductive and aristocratic, the sensuality of the materials mixed with strong original art recreates the style of club that exists in an idealized version of Manhattan. Like Ralph Lauren with his inflated, theatrical perfection of WASP elegance, Bilhuber created a club far more stylish than these clubs ever would have been. Unlike many hotels in New York, the City Club is all about the guest rooms, not the public spaces. These are rooms where you can comfortably and cosily cocoon away from the hubbub of the metropolis. The best part, unlike its neighbours the Harvard Club and the New York Yacht Club, is that you don`t need to be a member
The Rooms
Queen Luxe
Airy open room with one queen size feather down bed, located at the front or side of the building, some with city views and suede daybed (295 sq ft)
King Luxe
Airy open room with one king size feather down bed and suede daybed, located at the front or side of the building, some with city views and (365 sq ft)
Grand Duplex Suite
Luxurious double height suites with a downstairs living room/dining area, powder room and spiral staircase leading up to a master bedroom with King size feather down bed and luscious chocolate marble bathroom, original ornate ceilings, BOSE Ipod speakers and a private balcony.