The Bryant Park Hotel

Manhattan

Midtown Manhattan runs from Union Square to Central Park South. Recognizable by its numerous skyscrapers, it’s an important center for businesses of all kinds. Bryant Park is a 3.9-hectare oasis of peace, in the heart of midtown, a pleasant French style garden lost in the midst of huge skyscrapers. Nicknamed the little Luxembourg Gardens, it is visited by a host of New Yorkers throughout the day, who sit in the park’s metal chairs and try for a moment to escape the hustle and bustle of the city. Others come here to picnic during their lunch hour or to play chess or bocce. Still others come here to read the books loaned to them by an open-air library. Opened in 1843 under the name of Reservoir Park, it hosted the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations in 1853. It took its present name in 1884 in honor of William Cullen Bryant a newspaper publisher and abolitionist and also became part of the adjacent New York Public Library. In the 1980s, it became a venue for drug dealers and was closed for renovation and rehabilitation, although it continued to host seasonal events such as Fashion Week, the Christmas market with its celebrated ice skating rink and the Bryant Park Summer Film Festival during which some of the world’s great classic films can be viewed outdoors and free of charge.

Welcome to Gotham City

The 23-story American Radiator Building dominating Bryant Park seems to have come out of an American comic book. Similar to the Chicago Tribune Tower designed by the same architect, this black and gold skyscraper looks like a hideout for Batman in the center of Gotham City. The black brick and the Gothic gold-coated motifs of its façade give no inkling of the great simplicity inside the hotel. And yet, The Bryant Park Hotel is chic but sober.

At the end of the black marble tile hall, we find the reception area lacquered in red. In the rooms, relatively spacious for New York, we find the same chic and simple design with light oak colored Italian furniture, hand made Tibetan carpets, soft leather armchairs, Egyptian cotton sheets and cashmere blankets. Some of the rooms have a loft feeling with their wood parquet floors. They all face the park and some even have balconies.

As soon as it opened in 2001, it attracted movie stars, well known musicians and the great names in the world of fashion for the famous Fashion Week. And since the opening of the Koi restaurant, the little brother of the Koi in Los Angeles, the number of celebrities has increased. Elegant with its arched ceiling, bamboo decorations and its carp basin, the Koi proposes Japanese specialties with a New York touch. People come here to try the Kobe filet mignon, spicy grilled tuna or simple sushi dishes before attending a sneak preview screening in the basement movie theatre or going to listen to a disc jockey’s mix in the Cellar Bar under an earthenware ceiling.

It was in The Bryant Park that Isaac Singer presented the first sewing machine and Elisha Otis the first elevator at the Exhibition of the Industry of All Nations in 1853, an industrial revolution that gives the building an incomparable historical aura.