Re: Ian Schrager hotels
I lucked out and got a room at Morgan’s cheap this week.
Morgan’s is an Ian Schrager hotel on the corner of Madison and E. 37th. It’s a virtual wonderland of fashionista cluelessness.
First, a little background: For a glorious few moments, Ian Schrager and Steve Rubell reigned as the founders, owners, and operators of (bow your heads, please) Studio 54, the disco all discos (of that era and this one) wish they could be.
I say “for a few moments” because they got nailed for tax evasion (and I believe drug possession and distribution) by the Feds, spent some time in the clink, and after that, their disco days were numbered (literally, for Steve Rubell; he died of AIDS in 1989). In the mid-80’s, after a few more less successful nightclub ventures, they decided that hotels just weren’t cool enough as they were, so they started a line of high-design, high-end boutique hotels, of which Morgan’s was the first.
I had to pre-pay for my stay, which is usually the mark of a hotel in crisis: my guess is, there are few people these days willing to pay $250 per night for a 10’ x 15’ room, no matter how cute the concept is.
My room is on the 17th floor, and is smaller than my room at home, but I find it quite cozy. It looks directly into the windows of the luxury lofts across Madison, which is fun. The queen-size bed is low to the floor with down pillows, duvet, and 300-thread-count sheets with a Scottish wool throw. Pretty nice, but nothing anyone who watches “HGTV” couldn’t throw together after a lucky trip to TJ Maxx.
Bathrooms are tricky in historic hotels; most of them were built during a time when people didn’t spend nearly as much time in them or need as much room for their stuff as they do now (Morgan’s building was built in 1909). This one, at about 5’ x 6’, is no exception. The bathroom features a large steel basin, which is great, but the shower has more form than function: basically a depression in the granite floor (slippery as hell) with a glass door that doesn’t seal (water seeps out everywhere, making the rest of the floor slippery). Not the worst bathroom I’ve ever seen, but not the best, either.
The most fun part of this place is that they never fail to give you a chance to spend money (and lots of it). Room service comes from the trendy restaurant downstairs (“Asia de Cuba”). Nothing on the menu is less than ten dollars, including side salads and single glasses of wine. There’s a price list for everything. The spa soap is free (from their Agua Spa in LA; unleashing, I suppose, the beautifying power of, you know, water), but everything else (shampoo, conditioner, lotion, etc.) you have to shell out $30 for a 14 oz. bottle. You can buy the sheets, pillows, duvet, and custom Scottish throw right off the bed for a grand total of about $2000 (yeah, as if I were going to buy sheets from a hotel).
The mini-bar is really quite impressive. It not only includes the usual assortment of top-shelf liquor ($5 - $10), beer and wine ($5 - $20), assorted international snacks ($2.50 - $10), but you can also buy a Zagat restaurant guide ($20), sewing kit (the same kind you can buy at any supermarket for two dollars) ($10), first aid kit (band-aids, Neosporin, ibuprofen, a roll of Tums) ($10), and the most fascinating thing in the room, the euphemistically-named Intimacy Kit (it’s a little plastic case with a picture of one of those cheesy 70’s sunsets on it, listing the contents with revolting clinical accuracy: “Two spermicidally-lubricated Durex condoms, two obstetrical towlettes, one packet of lubricant”) for the outrageous price of $10.
7:35:49 AM 
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