Nice staff. Amenities lacking.
We stayed at The Marcel at Gramercy overnight while we were in New York for a series of business meetings. The staff were friendly, helpful, and accommodating, which was fantastic. The amenities; however, feel short of expectation.
I was told upfront when I checked in that my room would be small. It was! Boy was it ever. I think I would describe it as being mini. So small that I had to precariously balance my carry-on suitcase on the cabinet under the tv and put my handbag in the bathroom on the toilet, as there was no where else to put it (no suitcase stand, desk, closet, or chair - and I'm a little fussy about having my things on the floor).
The bed was on the hard side, which may be good or bad depending on personal preference. I felt the sheets to be rather coarse. They felt scratchy against my skin.
As a business traveler spoiled with complimentary wifi access at most hotels I stay at, I was also surprised to find that the Marcel didn't have wifi that came with the room. That said, for a cost of $10USD per 24 hours, I was able to get connected. I found it interesting that to get wifi, there was a rather long online form to fill out that required me to enter all of my credit card information, rather than being able to charge it to the room. The form also asked for a shipping address, which was rather bizarre. What are you shipping me? (At 1 in the morning working on a presentation for the next day, it felt very long and laborious to fill out - but probably wouldn't have been half as noticeable if it were 1pm after a nice lunch while I was on vacay.) I was even more surprised to find that I could not then access the same wifi on my personal mobile devices. Thankfully, upon inquiring about the "you have exceeded your limit" message I received, I was relieved to be told that I would not have to pay again for each device; however, I would have to log out of each device before I could login to use the wifi on another one. The gentleman who assisted me sounded a little surprised that I wouldn't just do that naturally - which was fine for a one night stay; however, I would suggest that it's more and more regular for customers to own different communication devices and to use them for different reasons at the same time. Had I needed to stay for a longer stint for business, I likely would have preferred to stay at an alternative hotel with a more flexible connectivity solution.
Otherwise, the hotel was clean. Bathroom was nice and the product seemed also nice. As an aside, it was odd to see the "together we can make a difference" environmental card on my bed and then see several small plastic bottles of $5 water next to the bed. If you're trying to encourage environmental actions, maybe encourage your guests to drink the fantastic potable New York filtered water straight from the tap?
Anyway, if you stay here and some of the extra touches are important or necessary for you - I'd recommend another hotel. There are lots of fantastic boutique hotels in New York. The Distrikt Hotel being one of them (unbelievable beds there, by the way). However, for a decent, no-frills kind of standard room - it's good. It's also probably worth noting that for a cost, you can upgrade to a larger room with more beds - but also more space.