Hotel description

The Standard New York is a hip, boutique hotel in the trendy Meat-Packing area of New York. The latest creation from hotelier Andre Balazs, the Standard New York sits atop the High Line (the large renovation project that aims to turn old elevated railways into an outdoor shopping area) near where 14th street meets the Hudson River. The building is one of the tallest in the neighborhood and has sweeping views of the city and/or river.

Andre Balázs’s line of Standard hotels took its time getting to New York. Now it seems they were waiting for something big, and this is it — for a group that’s made its name with clever renovations, a ground-up new build is a major undertaking.

The Standard looks more or less like a slightly bent UN building on stilts, straddling the High Line, the elevated railway that’s in the process of becoming lower Manhattan’s new green paradise. Even the interiors feel a bit utopian, decked out in a retro-future style that pays homage to Scandinavian mid-century modernism — a welcome departure from the faux-Romantic grittiness that seems to prevail in the Meatpacking District.

Bedrooms are compact, this being Manhattan, but they’re made bigger by clever planning and expansive views — New Jersey, in particular, looks good from this angle. The bathrooms are raising eyebrows for their transparent lack of privacy, but this place is for lovers, not room-sharing businessmen or pairs of traveling missionaries.