Andaz 5th Avenue NYC Review

I’ve heard frequently from others about the Andaz 5th for a few years now.  Gary of View From The Wing swears by the property as his go-to in NYC and has written about it numerous times.

I’ve had my fair share of stays in Manhattan, and consider Hyatt to be my go-to chain there.

I’ve written about my first stay at Hyatt 48Lex, which I definitely enjoyed.

I also chronicled my thoughts on the newly renovated Grand Hyatt located at Grand Central.

I’ve also enjoyed a few stays at the Andaz Wall Street.  But, this was my first stay at Andaz 5th.  It’s located at the corner of 41st and 5th, right near Grand Central and the NYC Public Library.

Since this was the first time in a while that Mickie and I had gotten away I decided to burn one of my suite upgrades to get us a bit of a nicer room.  According to Gary, we ended up with the standard upgrade, something I might have gotten if I hadn’t used an upgrade depending on occupancy.  But, I’ve been lucky enough to get upgraded quite frequently over the last couple of years and haven’t used up all my suite upgrades in the past.  So, it seemed worthwhile to guarantee a nice room for our short stay prior to our day at the US Open with Andre Agassi.

The room was two separate rooms, though no door between them.  We had a spacious living area (at least by Manhattan standards) complete with a very functional kitchen area.

The bedroom was nicely appointed and had a great view of the library.  Not the greatest pillows I’ve ever slept on, but a very comfortable bed.

Even though we took the points as our Diamond amenity, we ended up getting a nice plate of fresh fruit courtesy of the property when we returned to our room later that evening as well.

I’m a fan of rain showers and this one was a great effort.  Plenty of room, decent water pressure.  Spacious bathroom overall.

Small glitch in the morning.  One of the small things I’ve really grown accustomed to with Hyatt hotels is that they stock all their rooms with a tube of toothpaste.  Our room was missing it, but a quick call down to the front desk resolved it.

My wife and I grabbed some room service breakfast before departing.  Another perk of being a Diamond member at this property is that you can take your free breakfast in your room.  Perfect since we were in a rush this morning.  There was some fruit and granola, a bagel and lox, and Gary’s famously favorite lemon poppyseed pancakes.

I had placed the breakfast order the night before on the phone with someone and ordered pineapple juice to drink.  The following morning when they delivered the breakfast they brought my wife’s tea but no juice for me.  When I inquired about it the gentleman delivering our breakfast apologized and said that he thought they didn’t have pineapple juice.  I asked him if their fresh squeezed orange juice had pulp (not a big fan of pulp in my juice, like everyone needed to know that) and he said he’d be happy to strain a glass for me and bring it back up.  He was back a few moments later.

Everything was tasty.  The pancakes were probably not as much a favorite for me as they were for Gary.  I definitely liked the consistency of the pancake itself.  They bake orange slices into the middle of the pancakes which made them a bit messy to eat, IMO.  The syrup contains the poppyseeds and is a good accompaniment.  I don’t like a lot of syrup on my pancakes.  There’s still a good mix of savory and sweet with these between the pancakes, orange slices and a bit of syrup.  This is probably the most I’ve ever written about pancakes in my life, and they were good.  It’s New York, so the bagel was pretty darn good too.

When we checked in, the employee that valeted our car told us to allow 20 minutes when we wanted to pick it up.  Since I knew we’d be in a hurry I called down 30 minutes early for the car.  When we got downstairs our car was still not up.  Nobody at the front desk was sure if it was on it’s way or not.  After about 10 minutes of trying to find the car it finally showed up, somewhat oblivious.

What you need to know: Despite some minor bumps, I thought the service was top-notch.  The hotel is in great shape, the rooms are well-maintained.  It’s well located and has a decent restaurant, though I didn’t dine there this visit.

We ate at City Crab the one evening we were in town, an old favorite of ours down on Park Avenue.

For me, it’s a toss-up between this property and Hyatt 48Lex, although I would lean towards Andaz 5th for suite upgrades.  I would definitely pick either of these properties over the Grand Hyatt, and any of the Starwood properties I’ve stayed at in NYC in the past (including Le Parker Meridien).