The Conrad New York opened its doors yesterday in Manhattan’s Battery Park City neighborhood, right on the Hudson River waterfront. The 463 all-suite hotel is the first New York property from Conrad Hotels & Resorts.
The design sounds wonderful: Guests enter into a sunlit 15-story atrium highlighted by a blue and purple Sol LeWitt painting rising 13 floors above the registration desk. (Fun fact: The work, entitled Loopy Doopy (Blue and Purple), is reportedly LeWitt’s largest, spanning 100 feet x 80 feet, and required 100 gallons of paint and 3,000 hours to finish.)
There are approximately 2,000 other art selections throughout the hotel: Pat Steir has created a wall painting entitled Topsy Turvy in the hotel’s Gallery Ballroom. Other site-specific works include Imi Knoebel’s Mennige (Polygon) in the east entry of the Atrium lobby. Guests will also find artwork from other contemporary artists in their rooms, including Mary Heilmann, Elizabeth Peyton, and Sara Sosnowy.
Nice touch for those who drive: The hotel provides valet parking, a unique feature for a New York City hotel.
Conrad New York’s signature full-service restaurant, Atrio, serves contemporary Mediterranean cuisine prepared in an open kitchen with a wood-stone oven. Executive Chef Anthony Zamora, who recently came from Four Seasons Hotel New York, will oversee the restaurant, rooftop bar and in-room dining with dishes inspired by his Italian and Lebanese roots.
Loopy Doopy, the hotel’s rooftop bar, will be open seasonally from spring to autumn, serving up small plates, cocktails and 180-degree views of the Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, New York Harbor and the Hudson River. Directly above the bar will be a green roof designed by renowned landscape architect Ken Smith, including a garden with fresh herbs and vegetables for the culinary teams at Atrio and Danny Meyer’s North End Grill, located next door to the hotel.
And if guests want something a little less formal, the neighborhood around the hotel has plenty of casual dining options. The popular Shake Shack, which provides a modern take on a “roadside” burger stand, opened in the summer of 2011, and was joined earlier this year by Blue Smoke’s second New York City location, serving Chef Kenny Callaghan’s authentic pit barbecue. In January, North End Grill was added, a modern American bar and grill from Chef Floyd Cardoz, winner of Season 3 of Bravo’s Top Chef Masters.
Best of all, the Conrad New York is pursuing Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Gold certification for New Construction from the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) for sustainable building practices and design. Once certified, the hotel will be the first LEED Gold new construction project in an existing building in New York. Environmentally-friendly considerations at the Conrad include: a green roof and chef’s roof garden, bike racks for public use, low flow plumbing fixtures for water conservation, LED lights that consist of more than 60 percent of all the lighting in the hotel, low VOC materials to promote indoor air quality, and Energy Star kitchen equipment
The Conrad New York is located at 102 North End Avenue in New York City. Visit www.conradnewyork.com for more information.