Refinery Hotel

We had a wonderful stay with our family of four, which includes two teens. We were welcomed with glasses of wine and the same hospitality was consistent through our entire stay. When we had a small issue with noise from a service elevator, the staff handled it immediately and with care. Great location and easy to walk to shows and landmarks. We will be back and highly recommend

Overall a nice hotel with some clever decor and nice little touches including several nods to its location in the garment district. Not quite 5-star with a few bits of upkeep and maintenance needed here and there but not too bad really. Staff all pleasant. Rooms pretty decent and spacious (we had a “Standard Studio Queen Bed“ for 2 adults), bed was very comfy (on the soft side), and housekeeping did a great job replenishing everything and tidying up. Loved the nice smelling quality toiletries too. Location wise perfect for accessing many of the main tourist attractions, it’s located on a ‘side street’ that isn’t too loud or busy but just a few blocks from the bustling streets of broadway & Times Square - the best of both worlds. However this area isn’t the best for restaurants or bars - don’t get me wrong there are plenty but they tend to either be tourist traps or not particularly interesting (west village area much better for that!). Having said that, we particularly liked being able to walk around the corner to Bryant Park and there are decent coffee & pastry shops near there as well as easy access to the subway. We were however left with a bit of a sour note when we only found out about a $45 per day facility fee that had been added to our bill and only mentioned on the emailed receipt after checking out - at no point was this declared or made clear up front and we feel this is a deceptive way of charging higher prices for the rooms than what they are actually advertised for, particularly as there aren’t really many ‘facilities’ to make use of at this hotel and the way they describe them (such as WiFi) is “complementary” - that’s not really the case when you’re essentially paying a premium price for them! Just be upfront about your prices so we know what we’re paying! We were also a bit miffed that we were charged $10 per person ‘entertainment fee’ for the jazz bar musicians despite the fact when we entered the band were almost finished (nobody mentioned when the band would finish, or the fact that the bar was closing soon either - this was 10.30pm on a Saturday in the ‘city that never sleeps’!). Overall I would recommend staying here but make sure to factor the facility fee into the prices and maybe check if other hotels are adding that fee or not.

Overall we had a good stay but... We had to change rooms twice before we got one that didn't have a damp musky smell...possibly connected to the fact you cannot open the windows. Worth noting that the staff couldn't have been more helpful with this problem. My biggest issue is with the roof terrace. It is advertised as part of The Refinery but is not owned by the hotel. It was almost always fully booked during the evenings so not available to hotel guests. Plus my wife and I found the staff rude and a bad reflection on the hotel. The cleanliness of the rooms was patchy. Our minibar hadn't been cleaned and it took the staff two days to rectify this. There was litter under the table. On a positive note the front desk staff were fabulous throughout our stay.