My wife and I were able to score tickets for a New Year’s Eve party in Times Square to celebrate the new year by using United MileagePlus miles. We managed to get tickets for my in-laws too, so we needed to stay somewhere in New York City that was pet-friendly and which could accommodate four people.
Despite only booking about six weeks before December 31, there was award availability at the Thompson Gild Hall and we were able to use a Suite Upgrade Award to lock in a one bedroom suite for the night.
Thompson Gild Hall Bottom Line Review
We felt fortunate to get such a spacious suite for four people so (relatively) close to New Year’s Eve. The standard rooms at Gild Hall only accommodate two people, so I booked that for me and my wife, then emailed my concierge to ask her to apply the Suite Upgrade Award to a one bedroom suite and add the two additional guests to our room which she was able to do with no problem.
We didn’t spend too much time at the hotel considering why we were in the city, but we enjoyed our stay. The one bedroom suite was a great size (560 sq ft) for being in New York City and was plenty comfortable for accommodating four people. We gave my in-laws the bedroom, while my wife and I slept on the sofa bed. Perhaps it was thanks to how much we’d imbibed at the party that night, but it was the most comfortable sofa bed we’ve ever slept on. There was no metal bar digging into our back along the middle of it and it felt much wider than your average sofa bed.
Although it’s in Lower Manhattan, there’s a subway station nearby that offers a straight shot to Times Square. Overall it was a great one night stay and we’d be more than happy to return to the Thompson Gild Hall in the future depending on what we needed from the stay.
- Points Price: I believe that Gild Hall used to be a category 4 property which made it a great use of the category 1-4 free night certificates you can earn in a few different ways with World of Hyatt. It’s since increased to category 5 which means it now costs 17,000, 20,000 or 23,000 points per night depending on if it’s at off-peak, standard or peak pricing respectively. As you might expect, seeing as it was New Year’s Eve when we visited we redeemed 23,000 points for the stay.
- Cash Price: Cash prices can vary hugely. For New Year’s Eve, a standard room cost 682.87 including tax. The one bedroom suite we upgraded to using a Suite Upgrade Award was retailing for $1,096.74 that night.
- Points Value: We got pretty much 3cpp of value based on the standard room award pricing versus cash cost. Hyatt seems to have weird pricing at some properties in New York City when comparing cash to points requirements, so during off-peak award pricing periods it’d be worth double checking what the cash rate is too.
- Resort or Destination Fee: $32.50 per night, although this is waived on award stays whether you have status with Hyatt or not. You can find a full list of what’s included as part of the destination fee here. I can’t stand resort/destination fees, but if you’re paying a cash rate for only a one night stay and can make good use of what’s included, you could get more than $32.50 of value which isn’t always the case at other hotels charging these kinds of fees. For longer paid stays, I doubt you’d get as much value per day. For example, here are some of the additional benefits you could make use of (see the full list using the link above):
- Welcome Glass of Prosecco (per registered guest) upon arrival
- Morning Coffee/tea service (6 AM – 10 AM)
- 10% off at Felice Restaurant
- Use of vintage-inspired bicycles
- Up to (2) Comp 30 minute Citi bike passes per room (one per registered guest) (Via Lyft Pass + Promo Code
- Parking: The hotel offers overnight valet parking for compacts & sedans for $65 per night, or $70 per night for SUVs and oversized vehicles. If you have Globalist status in the World of Hyatt program you get free parking on award stays; you also get free parking on award stays if you redeem a Guest of Honor award when not a Globalist member.
- 1 Bedroom Suite (King Suite): As mentioned earlier, we booked a standard room and used a Suite Upgrade Award to lock in an upgrade to a King Suite which is a one bedroom suite. You can take a virtual tour of the King Suite here.
This had a spacious living room with a wet bar area off to the side. The bedroom wasn’t huge, but was still a good size for it being in Manhattan. The bathroom was also a decent size for the city, but both the bedroom and bathroom had a feature that I hate – frosted glass doors. I don’t care about it from a privacy aspect, but it means that if someone turns on the light in the bathroom it lights up the entire living room which is annoying if someone’s actually using the sofa bed. The bedroom having a frosted glass door is even more annoying because it negates one of the main benefits of having a separate bedroom and living room if you can’t have lights on in the living room while someone’s trying to sleep in the bedroom. - Housekeeping: With us only staying one night, we didn’t need to ask for housekeeping. The King Suite was (to my not overly observant eye when it comes to these kinds of things) spotless though when we checked in.
I’m not sure if it should fall under this housekeeping category or something else, but it was a little strange that the only toiletries in the bathroom were small bottles of shampoo, conditioner and body wash. That’s fine for two people, but our reservation was for four people and isn’t really enough if everyone wants to have a shower. - Turndown service: I’m not sure if turndown service is officially offered. However, they did make up the sofa bed while we were out that evening.
- Internet: I did a little bit of work before we headed out that night and the internet speed seemed decent enough.
- Dining: Gild Hall has one restaurant/bar as well as a separate bar:
- Felice Restaurant – This is both a restaurant and bar and is just off the lobby.
- La Soffitta – I’d missed the existence of this until checking the hotel website when writing this review. This is apparently a 35 seat wine bar on a higher floor.
- Club Lounge: None
- Spa: None
- Fitness Room: Yes. I didn’t have a chance to check it out though before we checked out.
- Pool: No.
- Welcome Amenity: There was a bottle of wine and a small box of four truffles waiting for us in the suite when we arrived. I’d assumed that this was by virtue of having Globalist status, but the note with it said ‘Happy New Year’, so perhaps all guests (or all guests checking in on New Year’s Eve) got that.
All guests get a welcome glass of Prosecco when arriving too, regardless of whether you have status or not. - Service: Service was pretty good. The front desk staff were friendly, as well as being apologetic that our room wasn’t ready when we arrived early (which was fair enough). Be aware that the destination fee and its benefits weren’t mentioned at all during check-in, so you might have to proactively ask about those if you want to make use of any of them during your stay. That includes the prosecco – I had to ask about that, despite it sitting on a table right behind them. That said, the front desk agent offered me a top up when coming back down later on, so that was nice.
- Pet Policy: The Thompson Gild Hall is a pet-friendly hotel which charges a $75 pet fee per stay. They allow up to two dogs per room, with a weight limit of 50 lbs per dog or 75 lbs combined weight for two dogs; I’m not sure how strictly they enforce that as our pup is only 10 lbs.
There isn’t really any grass near the hotel, so you’ll need to walk a few blocks if your pup needs that. - Location: The hotel is in Lower Manhattan, a few blocks south of The Beekman – another Thompson property we stayed at last year. That means it’s not a long walk to places like the 9/11 Memorial, the Battery and the Brooklyn Bridge.
Although that means it’s a bit of a distance from places like midtown, Central Park, etc., within a couple of blocks you have the Fulton St and Wall St subway stations.
If flying in to JFK, you can take the AirTrain to Howard Beach Station and then get the subway to Fulton St station which takes about an hour. - Elite Benefits: I have Globalist status with Hyatt. We were eligible for a suite upgrade at check-in, but didn’t want to risk that selling out seeing as we needed a room for the four of us and standard rooms there only accommodate two people. We therefore redeemed a suite upgrade award ahead of time to guarantee that we’d get a suite.
As for elite benefits we did receive, we got free breakfast at Felicia restaurant which – generously – was extended to all four of us (I’d expected us to only get free breakfast for two). There’s a limited menu for those with free breakfast – photos of the menu and descriptions of the items can be found at the end of this review. Free breakfast for Globalist members includes an eligible entrée, tea or coffee and orange juice.
Beware ordering soda though. My wife and I both ordered soda which isn’t covered; the server had let us know this, but we hadn’t anticipated how expensive that would become. We were each given a thin, short-ish glass of Diet Coke which mostly consisted of large ice cubes. There was maybe 4oz of soda in each glass, so we both asked for another later on. It turns out that soda costs $5 and there aren’t free refills, so we paid $20 + tax + tip for what amounted to little more than a can of soda.
The property offers valet parking, so that was free for us as we’d booked an award stay as a Globalist member.
We could’ve taken advantage of a 4pm late checkout, but I wanted to get back to our other hotel in time for a Liverpool game that day. We did stay until about 1pm though thanks to having status. - Would I stay again? Absolutely, although it would also depend on the circumstances. If we were only needing a one night stay in the city for just the two of us and didn’t care about room upgrades, I might be more likely to book us in at The Beekman as they don’t charge a pet fee.
For a longer stay where we wanted to stay in a one bedroom suite and we had an opportunity to lock in the King Suite again, I’d be more likely to choose Gild Hall as it was lovely having such a spacious suite. It’s also one of the cheapest Hyatt properties in Manhattan points-wise which is another thing going for it.
Pros & Cons
Pros
- Value – Can be good value booking with points.
- Suite size – I don’t know how spacious the standard rooms feel, but the King Suite is a great size for Manhattan (560 sq ft)
Cons
- Frosted doors – The frosted doors between the bedroom and living room and between the living room and bathroom meant that if a light was on in one room, it lit up the other room quite brightly.
- Location – The location certainly isn’t bad, especially if you want to be in Lower Manhattan, but you’re looking at a 15 minute subway ride to get to Times Square.
- Soda at breakfast – It’s a niche problem I know seeing as most people will be happy with juice and tea or coffee, but charging $25+ (including tip) for soda for two people for two tiny glasses of soda each is excessive.
Image Gallery
King Suite – 1 Bedroom Suite
Felice Restaurant – Breakfast
Other Hotel Photos
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[…] We gave Shae’s mom and stepdad the bedroom, while we slept on the sofa bed in the living room. It was the most spacious and comfortable sofa bed I’ve ever slept on, so we got a great night’s sleep (the open bar at the New Year’s Eve party probably helped with that too!) I wrote a review of our stay over on Frequent Miler, so you can read a review of that here. […]
No offence intended but I never am able to upgrade to a suite using earned upgrades. The only time I see an upgrade happen is when bloggers get one.
With Hyatt? If there’s standard suite availability, you should always be able to use a suite upgrade award. I know this is an issue with Marriott, but not Hyatt.
I stayed at Gild Hall twice when it’s still cat 4.
Decent service and diligent housekeeper, no complaint about service. I never dined there due to tons of good restaurants around, and Felice is too small and always crowded.
If Gild Hall is back to cat 4, I definitely will stick with them, it’s really a bargain.
I stayed in Gild Hall during a recent trip to NYC. I’d say the hotel is quite elegant for the price. However there were some things I thought were sub-par: the rooms aren’t that well insulated and the heater tends to cycle between fairly large temperature ranges. There is just a comforter, no sheets nor an extra blanket (I suspect this is a cost saving measure), so that plus the temperature swings for me were a bit uncomfortable. I thought the breakfast benefit was pretty limited – only four items, not even pancakes as an alternative. A manager later explained the restaurant is not run by the hotel so the breakfast options are limited by their terms. I would have liked to have at least the option to order some pastries or something (I’m not a fan of eggs, so the avocado toast was my only option).
Overall, a nice hotel but I’m not sure I’ll stay again. I did get a nice note from a manager after I mentioned these issues in my review.
I personally think the Hyatt Place Long Island City is a great deal, a Cat 4, and spacious rooms for New York, quite convenient to the city. Breakfast is just the usual meh Hyatt Place quality, but it’s still a fun stay.
HP LIC is right next to elevated highway, too noisy even you’re on the other side. Stayed there once when it was still cat 3. Definitely not worthy it, highly “NOT” recommend it!!
Better go JC Regency or HH, cat 4 with Hudson view.
Totally disagree on HP LIC. I’ve stayed there numerous times, never found the road noise even slightly bothersome. It’s also a beautiful view from those upper floor rooms. Location is vastly better than the Jersey hotels you’re talking about. I’m a Globalist so even though they don’t have to they always give me a high floor room. Rooms are huge by NYC standards and very clean and new. Love this location except for the meh Hyatt Place breakfast. Also I got high floor rooms even as an Explorist, so they’re nice to elites for a Hyatt Place.
Hey Stephen,
I didn’t realize you are a LFC fan. Next time you’re in NYC and they’re playing, check out the scene at the local fan bar – 11th St Bar.
Also, FYI, there’s a typo in your review in the Dining section. You wrote the Beekman when you meant Gild Hall.
Thanks for the tip about that bar – I’d not heard of that before. And thanks for catching the typo – I’ve fixed that.
Thanks for the review, Stephen!
We’re fellow diet soda at breakfast people, so we appreciate the detail about the exorbitant charge. Given that Hyatt T&C requires “juice or coffee” be included with the Globalist breakfast, it’s odd that the hotel would substitute a diet soda.
Have you tried Hyatt Place Secaucus yet? That wouldn’t have worked for this stay, but at a Category 2 it’s the best points value that’s an easy ride to NTC IMO.
We’ve not stayed at that Hyatt Place yet – might have to give that a try in the future.
It is a little worn, but for a Cat 2, it is a pretty good value. The sterile office park leaves a bit to be desired, but the bus service to Port Authority is pretty solid. I used it for a SNF game at the stadium. I’m not sure I would prefer it for going into Manhattan unless I really needed to save points. The LIC location is just so much better for access.
I can absolutely see LIC working better for many–and it’s especially good if you’ve a 1-4 night cert to burn.
It’s true that Secaucus is not a scenic location. But for many the convenience factor will be high. It’s right next to a Walmart Supercenter, Starbucks and Dunkin Doughnuts. . And it’s hard to beat its 6,500-9,500 point redemption values for something NYC-accessible.