An Aging Grand Dame
This was my first trip back to the City in two years. Because of the location, I had gotten in the habit of staying at the London; however, because they didn't offer a room with two doubles or queens (my adult daughter was joining me for two nights), I decided to return to one of my favorite hotels: the St.Rregis on 55th Street and 5th Avenue What I found was a property with rooms in need of serious refreshing. The beds were old and creaky and the down duvets and pillows had been replaced with synthetic fill. The latter didn't breathe and left you sweating even with the air conditioning turned up full tilt.. The room controls were tied into an aging and tempermental phone system which made it difficult to operate the lights, use the phone or summon the on-call, floor butler. The TV remote didn't work, the make-up mirror was broken, one of the sinks was stopped up, and the toilet area lacked its own light and fan. As always the service was top notch but it could not make up for all of the above and a very dear $700+ nightly price tag.