I should say this first about The Mark Hotel New York – If you like luxury and the finer things in life and are comfortable hanging with millionaires, this hotel is fine and you will enjoy it. It’s just not my cup of tea and I personally wouldn’t stay here again. You could say “why did you book it”, and that’d be fair, but for one I didn’t book it and 2/ I’ve stayed in a few fancy hotels around the world and haven’t come across this kind of snobbery at of them.
So here we go, my thoughts about The Mark Hotel New York. This is the most pretentious, snobbish and arrogant hotel I’ve ever stayed in and I’d never come back here again. It’s located in New York’s posh Upper East Side, and during our stay, Kate Spade decided to off herself less than a block away, which should give you some idea of the area. It’s posh, and full of the wealthiest people in the city.
Without a doubt, if you want to stay outside the main tourist areas, have way too much money for your own good and don’t care to look what anything costs, the Mark Hotel New York is for you. For sure, it’s nice, has lovely rooms, interiors, furnishings, fixtures and everything is top notch, with one notable exception, and that is the staff, in particular one individual that I’m going to single out. In 45 years of staying in hotels, I’ve never come across staff this stuck up and high and mighty. He walks around with his head so far up his ass, I’m surprised he’s still white. You don’t even get a reply if you say good morning to him, and some of the other staff milling around the lobby area aren’t much better. Sorry, that’s not fair, I got a grunt from one of them one morning.
The front desk desk staff at The Mark Hotel New York are friendly and polite, what you’d expect from this type of hotel, but this one guy in particular never once acknowledged us, didn’t even get a a reaction out of him when saying a friendly good morning, and only appeared to be nice and actually acknowledge us when we were checking out and attempting to help with the bags. I would rather shit my pants and walk 18 holes with said poo in my pants in front of 15 million viewers than give this asshole a tip. When I didn’t tip him for opening up the car door, he walked away shaking his head. If I hadn’t of had Grobbler with me, I’d have got out and told him what a prick he was and that he basically only said hello when there was money to be had. He’s a bald headed, or shaven headed guy who hangs out at the lobby and by the door.
House cleaning staff, in particular the mini-bar re-filler guy, just come in with basically no waiting, knock and enter type thing, this is typical of the attitude of the staff, thinking they’re absolute fucking legends and can do whatever they want. There is nothing that can make up for the superiority that many of the staff exhibit at The Mark Hotel New York, and the vast majority of the guests looked just as stuck up and entitled. We had some milk in a glass and they didn’t even bother to clean that, just left it out so it’s not as if the house cleaning was exemplary.
The food is ridiculously expensive, I guess what you might expect at a five star hotel in the Upper East Side located on Park Avenue and less than a minute from Central Park. But it’s not that spectacular and there are better dining options nearby. There’s a Japanese less than 100 metres away but that’s just as expensive, but at least the staff, in particular the guy at the reception, was extremely nice and basically the complete opposite of the wanker working the lobby at The Mark Hotel New York.
For something cheaper and less upscale to eat at, you’ll need to walk 10-15 minutes over to Lexington Ave as there’s very little cheaper (read: normal priced) restaurants anywhere in the area. This goes for shopping as well. The closest convenience store is also almost 1km away and the Mark Hotel is not a place to stay if you like to bring back snacks and food and drinks to your hotel for the kids.
There’s no great view, the knobs and dials for turning things like air conditioning, heating, lights and everything else like that are quite finicky and the freezer or fridge makes quite a loud noise every so often and can keep you up at night if you’re not a heavy sleeper. As briefly mentioned, the bathroom, beds and interiors are all nice, very nice. I think it’s French owned and/or operated which is not surprising at all.
It’s a brilliant location IF you want to hang out in Central Park most of your time, don’t care about being close to shopping, restaurants, and you think you’re gods gift to mankind (because you will fit right in with the staff here). I’d never stay here again, not least because of the price and mainly because the staff (and guests I interacted with) here are absolute snobbish pricks. The Mark Hotel New York is a nice hotel for sure, but again, just a little (lot) too high and mighty for my liking.
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If you want to eat nearby, make sure to avoid this place – Nectar Cafe – worst fish n chips ever, lemonade came half way through the meal, no change back after giving them $40 for a $30 meal. Instead of asking for it back I thought I’d just write about what a horrible, disgusting fish n chips this was. You know, this pretty summed up a lot of New York to me – rude people trying to get every penny out of you for providing shit service. Actually because this was about a block from the hotel we went back in the morning for breakfast. Had an ok bacon n egg sandwich, an orange juice, apple juice all for $25. Not really that cheap, but cheap for the area. That was ok, and the two older guys running the joint seemed to be a bit friendlier.
