Crosby Street Hotel

Stonehill Taylor put the building up from a parking lot mid-block, eleven stories and 85,000 square feet finished in 2009, fronted by steel and glass Crittall windows and a canopy shaped after a loading dock. It was the first hotel in New York State to reach LEED Gold, and the windows in the rooms still open. A bronze cat by Fernando Botero sits outside the door.

Kit Kemp designed all 86 rooms and no two match, running from 340 square feet on the second floor up to the one-bedroom Crosby Suites on the ninth, tenth and eleventh, where the view opens out across Lower Manhattan. Headboards are appliqued by hand in wool, the suite bathrooms come in granite and oak, and the art changes from one door to the next, dogs mostly. The Meadow Suite opens onto a terrace planted as a native woodland meadow, more than fifty flowering species in it.

The Drawing Room keeps two fireplaces with dog portraits over the mantels and an honesty bar poured on trust, cookies set out beside it. At the center of the building a courtyard Sculpture Garden gathers around one long table, the Crosby Bar opening onto an ivy-covered terrace at its edge, champagne and canapes going out there from five to six for anyone staying the night. Downstairs the screening room seats 107 in Poltrona Frau leather against wool-lined walls. An evening can pass indoors.