Room rates are relatively inexpensive by NYC standards
Near art galleries and many affordable restaurants and bars
Lobby bar for coffee, wine, and beer
One block from subway
Free Wi-Fi in every room
24-hour fitness center
Small rooms, even by New York standards
No restaurant or room service
No full-time concierge
No business center
This budget 81-room hotel offers a convenient downtown New York location and proximity to Chelsea's art galleries and eclectic restaurants. Guests love the rates and accept the trade-offs: minimal services and smaller-than-average standard rooms.
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Scene
This clean, budget property, conveniently located in Chelsea, serves everyone from college grads to seniors.
Smack in the middle of Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood, this hotel attracts budget-seekers of all stripes: recent college grads, artists looking to survey the neighborhood's hundreds of galleries, groups of girlfriends in town for a shopping spree, mature solo tourists, thirtysomething couples on a weekend getaway. All are looking for (and getting) the same thing: a clean, relatively inexpensive room in a convenient location, plus a few modestly luxurious touches like flat-screen TVs, rainfall showerheads, iHome clock radios with iPod docks, and fresh orchids in the hallways. At these prices, some sacrifices are to be expected: The rooms are small, even for New York, and there's no dedicated concierge, room service, or on-site restaurant. But as a place to lay your head for a few nights, it can often be a solid deal.
Location
On a pretty, residential block of 22nd Street, with Chelsea's famous art galleries and choice restaurants just a short walk away
Right in the heart of Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood, Gem enjoys the best of both worlds -- it's on a quiet, residential stretch of 22nd Street inhabited by lovely old brownstones, but just around the corner from bustling 8th Avenue with its eclectic selection of mid-priced restaurants and bars (many with sidewalk seating in the summer).Running from 14th Street to 34th Street on Manhattan's westside, the largely residential neighborhood of Chelsea is the center of both Manhattan's gay community and, with some 350 art galleries, New York's contemporary art scene. (Just two blocks west of the hotel, the art galleries start.) Chelsea is also a convenient midway point between downtown and midtown -- the West Village is just two subway stops down, and the Empire State Building just one subway stop up.- Three subway lines (the A, C, E) are just one block away.
Rooms
Rooms start at 135-square-foot -- but at this price, with free Wi-Fi and coffeemakers, the Gem's ideal for a cheap weekend in the city.
The standard rooms are, at 135 square feet, distinctly small even for a New York hotel room. There's virtually no room to store luggage, as the eight-inch wide side table and small white laminate wardrobe can't hold much. This is a great place to rest your head after a day exploring the city and that's about it -- most guests know this and treat it as such, leaving early in the morning and not returning till night.- Business-class room reach 195-square-foot and have a full-size desk
Features
Lobby bar, free Wi-Fi, and a modest fitness center
Family
With small rooms and no rollaways, cribs, or sofa sleepers, the Gem isn't really a sensible place to bring kids.
Not family-friendly in any meaningful way. It would be virtually impossible to squeeze more than two people into a room here, even if the other bodies are small. The hotel doesn't offer cribs or rollaways -- they wouldn't fit in the rooms. And the location, while convenient to many parts of the city, doesn't offer much for kids (unless they're really into art).
Business Room
Penthouse Suite
Queen Room
Standard Room
United States
