The Lotte was a very underwhelming experience, especially relative to the cost. We paid $900/night for a room in early December.
Pros
- Location is excellent, view was great, and rooms are large for NYC
- Lobby is nice, especially at Christmas time
- A handful of small experiences for kids at Christmas (Santa in the lobby on Sundays, letter placed in Santa’s mailbox in lobby receives an envelope to your room)
Cons
- Rooms are old and surprisingly dated (felt like a room from the 90s)
- Elevators are ridiculously bad. Multiple days we waited more than 10 minutes for an elevator down to the lobby. Stairs aren’t really an option for most rooms because of the height of the hotel (e.g., we were on 26th floor).
- Rooms are not serviced every day with no explanation
- Restaurant food tasted like a Hampton Inn continental breakfast (no offense to Hampton Inn; quality of food for 10x the price is shocking though).
- No evening turn down service which is strange for a high end hotel
- Staff is largely unhelpful. Concierge was especially poor, I tried making a breakfast reservation a few days out (at their own restaurant!) and she told me to go upstairs and talk to the restaurant hostess. Restaurant server was rude, he acted annoyed when he came to take our breakfast order and I asked him for a menu first. Doormen were friendly.
- Lobby was constantly packed with non-hotel guests taking photos and wandering around
I would not stay here again.