Dream Rating: 3.5 Pearls

Midtown West, Manhattan, New York City

Enormous statue in the lobby

I asked a manager to describe Dream's mission and vibe. She sort of shrugged her shoulders and looked around the lobby, which features a two-story fish tank, an enormous statue, and a model ship hanging over the front desk. "It's definitely pretty whimsical," she finally said.

The hotel's butterfly-laden Web site isn't much help: "In designing our first Dream ... we analyzed what makes Dreams so intriguing and why they are often better than our current reality. Most dreams symbolize what our mind's eye would have us pay attention to, what we ultimately would like to see in our daily lives. Our lobby allows for you to live in a bygone era while strangely occupying the thread in that time that you find yourself standing in." Trippy, but that's kind of the point.

The Dream’s stunning beaux arts building dates to 1895, and it definitely stands out amid Midtown’s office towers. On each floor the elevator opens to an illuminated mural (mine had a somewhat creepy seagull montage), and the hallway carpet creates the optical illusion of an elevated curvature. Beds and desks are backlit with blue lights, and beds are covered in plush (but hypoallergenic!) feather beds.

With both the Hearst Magazine building and Universal Music Group across the street, Dream attracts a lot of fashion and entertainment types. Management brags that Kanye West, Madonna and Beyoncé have all stayed there, though the hotel gets a healthy mix of non-celebrity leisure and business travelers.

Room service

As I approached the entrance, a doorman greeted me and offered to help me with my bag. At the front desk, two clerks were helping other guests. (I overheard one telling a couple there for six days that they should really upgrade to a larger room.) A third clerk showed up after only a few minutes to help me. She checked me in with no problems and was able to answer all my questions.

Room service routinely arrived quickly. I received pizza in only 15 minutes, and the following morning, a pot of coffee was at my door in 15 minutes as well.

There was no bathrobe stocked in my room, but after a few quick calls to the front desk, it was delivered in less than 10 minutes. Of course, it should have been there in the first place.

Though the hotel tries to pull off a super-hip atmosphere, several staff members were surprisingly friendly. A doorman chatted with me about taking pictures and offered to show me the hotel's two-story fish tank. It was a small gesture but a dramatic change from the nearby W hotel, where doormen at night act like tough bouncers. Likewise, I encountered no attitude from staff at the swanky bar Rm Fifty5.

I tested the concierge, who confidently pointed me to a great mani-pedi salon nearby. He was even able to recommend an emergency tailor (though for this, he just scratched the name down illegibly on a piece of paper).

View on a Larger Map

The immediate area around the hotel is mainly tall office buildings, though there are also plenty of restaurants, drug stores, ATMs and other convenient amenities.

New York City has three nearby airports: JFK, LaGuardia, and Newark (in New Jersey). Flying into JFK or LaGuardia is typically easiest and the least time-consuming. From JFK, it's a (one-hour) $45 flat-rate taxi ride to anywhere in Manhattan. From LaGuardia, it's about a (30-minute) $40 metered cab ride to Midtown Manhattan. Rides from Newark cost at least $40 (plus tolls) and can take more than 90 minutes. Don't forget to tip your driver 15 to 25 percent.

To save some cash, try the group shuttles that are available at all three airports for about $14 per person. For more information on the shuttles, go to Super Shuttle or New York Airport Service. You can also take public transit from any of the airports for as little as $7 per person, but travel can take up to two hours and involves a lot of lugging bags up and down stairs. For mass-transit directions right to the hotel, check out HopStop.com.

The Medium Room

My "medium-size" (that’s Dream lingo), 185-square-foot room actually felt more on the small side. It had a single window in the middle of the wall, and the narrow, 19.5-inch closet and equally narrow bathroom door each felt half-size. I could only fit my small suitcase in the closet and had very little room for anything else. Maybe it's a good thing, then, that the soft, fluffy bathrobe that should have been there was missing. (When I asked for one, it was at my door in 10 minutes.)

The desks glow a strange blue, with another blue light outlining the bed from behind. I appreciated the ethereal effect, but also liked that I could easily turn off the mood lighting in favor of more straightforward bedside lamps and overhead lights. (At the W New York, I had to make do with a glowing purple orb.) The modern desk wasn't very large and had a lot of sharp edges, but I liked the pop-up sockets and data port in the left-hand corner.

The highlight of the rooms -- and rightfully so, given the hotel's name -- is the queen bed, which practically floated with a soft duvet, pillow-top feather bed, and plush hypoallergenic pillows. The bed also has a good view of the 37-inch Panasonic flat-screen TV, which was inexplicably topped off by ugly fake wood paneling. The room can’t fit a dresser, but there are some extra drawers in the modern cupboard that houses the mini-bar. On top of the cupboard is a Bose wave radio (no CD player, though) and a few magazines.

The bathroom was quite small, though bright enough with a white and periwinkle blue color scheme. Overall it seemed to lack the style and fancy fixtures of similarly sized bathrooms at the W New York and Gild Hall, though it did have a window. On the other hand, the mirror was stained. The toiletries were from L’Occitane, which I liked until my hair ended up smelling like Play-Doh. The sink and tub were both unexciting until I took a shower and the hot water began to scream like a tea kettle. I also had a hard time getting the water to any temperature but scalding, which made for an unpleasant hair-washing experience.

Speaking of noises, the room’s thermostat also made a slight ticking noise. What with that, the glowing green light outside the window, and the traffic noise from Broadway, I sort of felt like the clichéd movie character unable to get to sleep in the distractingly bright and noisy big city.

Most rooms face either Broadway or quieter 55th Street, but because the hotel is taller than its neighbors, some rooms do face inward and get less light. My medium room had one small window, but it got a fair amount of natural light (at least from the ninth floor). If I stuck my head out of the window, I could even steal a glimpse of Times Square and the Late Show With David Letterman studio. I didn’t hear too much traffic noise from the ninth floor (though, as a New Yorker, I’m pretty used to it), but rooms on lower floors could definitely have an issue with this.

Free access to Gold's Gym across the street

The hotel has only a small fitness center on the floor beneath the lobby. It's open 24 hours and has one treadmill, two bikes, and some weights, but no personal TVs and very little space. However, the clerk informed me at check-in that I could work out for free at the Gold's Gym across Broadway at 54th Street. I was delighted to discover that we had full access to the gym and its three floors of modern equipment -- I could even participate in fitness classes.

A novel feature is Dream's connection to the Chopra Center & Spa, a yoga, meditation and ayurvedic spa facility spun off from celebrity guru Deepak Chopra's original California location. I wasn’t able to tour the spa -- though I did photograph the Broadway storefront -- but the Web site offers a very good virtual tour for those who are interested, and gets positive reviews from both New York magazine and Yelp.

The hotel also offers free Wi-Fi in the lobby, though it costs $10 in guest rooms. There are also two meeting/function rooms, which can cater to anywhere from six to 80 people, and a business center.

Kids might enjoy Dream's funky décor and design elements, but I found the overall vibe to be on the adult side, particularly given the small rooms and the plethora of pictures of naked women. Like most New York boutiques, the hotel definitely doesn't go out of its way to cater to children.

On the other hand, it’s not often that a room service menu specializes in kid-friendly pasta and pizza. And it’s hard to argue with a location so close to so many of New York’s top attractions.

There are scuff marks by the door and nicks on the bathroom floor, but overall the rooms and property are very clean. However, I put my room service tray out in the hall in the evening and found it still there when I checked out the following day at noon.

Serafina Restaurant

Dream is connected to two restaurants, Serafina, a New York chain that specializes in Italian food and upscale pizza, and Amalia, an upscale Mediterranean restaurant that gets a respectable 21/30 score from Zagat. Serafina is the room service restaurant, and I was pleased with the mushroom pizza and caprese salad that I had for dinner, as well as my poached eggs at breakfast. I strolled by Serafina in the evening, and it was definitely a happening spot, with groups drinking cocktails on couches and chandeliers sparkling in the dim light. A lot of online reviewers criticize the restaurant for its service, but I had no complaints about the food.

There are also tons of other restaurants within just a block of the hotel, ranging from diners to cafes to the famous Carnegie Deli, so it's not hard to find a variety of eating options in the neighborhood. And one of the largest, most comprehensive supermarkets in the city -- Whole Foods Columbus Circle -- is about a seven-minute walk north from the hotel.

Ava Lounge

I had a drink at Rm Fifty5, where cocktails ranged from $13 to $15, glasses of wine from $9 to 14, and beers from $7 to $8. Crystal chandeliers dripped blue glass teardrops above the bar, while an illuminated picture of a full moon behind it enhanced the nighttime feel created by black wood ceilings and a wall covered in pictures of birch trees. Couples huddled on love seats and couches while U2 played on the stereo. I came in expecting a lot of attitude from the staff, but instead found the bartender to be friendly and helpful. The bar brings in a DJ on the weekends and typically gets pretty crowded.

The penthouse bar, Ava Lounge, has panoramic windows with stunning views of Times Square and the Manhattan skyline. The roof deck, open year round (with tents and heaters in the winter), is a crowd pleaser. There’s a weekend DJ spinning hip-hop and retro music here as well, but it's also praised for not feeling overly crowded or poseur, and is a popular after-work spot. The walls are lined with dozens of pictures of bare-chested women – a Riviera theme, according to the hotel’s description – which might be a bit off-putting for some folks (though this is pretty tame by New York standards).