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What's On The Block at The Crosby Street Hotel?

Where: 79 Crosby Street [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

With a position right in the heart of SoHo, the question is more like “What’s Not on the Block?” Seriously, if you love shopping you could barely pick a better-positioned place to stay than the Crosby Street Hotel. Just remember that SoHo starts to feel like a mall on weekends, when every tourist and their mom hits Broadway to shop the chain stores and have a coffee from Dean & Deluca.

The actual block the hotel sits on is not the most exciting in the area, but it’s nice that it gets less traffic than both Broadway and Lafayette, the next streets over.

The side of the street opposite the hotel is basically all residential lofts and offices, and the backs of the stores that are on Broadway (including Dean and Deluca).

On the hotel’s side of Crosby—between Prince and Spring—there’s more of a mix: Savoy, a restaurant; Meet, a private-event space; a carpet store; an MZ Wallace handbag shop; a funky stationery store; Sur La Table, which sells kitchen supplies—and the Bjorn Borg store. Yes, really. There’s lots of colorful undies to gape at in the brightly lit window as you stroll past.

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First Look at the Crosby Street Hotel

Where: 79 Crosby Street [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

The Crosby Street Hotel has a website! Oh, glorious day! Not like we were checking every single day or anything, but this afternoon we were pleasantly surprised when the www.crosbystreethotel.com URL took us to a lovely and lively Firmdale page that led us to a purple sphere of wonder and merriment that appeared to be the official Crosby Street website — and there are pictures!

Granted, they're black and white pictures — but they're pictures. And the place looks...quaint! Quaint, but modern — and the place, as we have already found out, will have a courtyard, a lobby bar and a screening room.

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Crosby Street Hotel Construction Update: Getting Set for September

Where: 270 Lafayette St [map], New York, ny, United States, 100013

Is it bad that we have become so jaded and doubtful of a hotel's ability to open up as scheduled in this day and age (and by "day and age" we mean, of course, time and place: recession in the big city) that when we hear of a hotel on track to open a few months away, we sort of just sit back and wait for the delay announcements to come in? You know, for the delays to be delayed. Yeah, that's kind of bad, right?

Because it is, rather sadly, the first thing we thought when we'd heard the Crosby Street Hotel was still on track for an end-of-September opening (pushed back from March). The property is the first US outpost for London-based Firmdale Hotels, whose name was in papers this weekend because profits — yikes — had fallen 64%.

We checked in on the opening date, though, and a rep for the hotel promised the NYC property was still lookin' good for a September '09 go-time — and construction, per this shot the hotel sent us, seems to be coming along nicely. Also, we hear Firmdale has hired an artist who has been taking shots of the hotel's construction progress for the last year and they are "going to screen the result in their private cinema" when the hotel opens up.

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Crosby Street Hotel Still Set For a September Opening

Where: 270 Lafayette St [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

The scene at the site of the Crosby Street in March.

We think that after nearly two years of delays it's totally fair of us to be getting impatient with the progress of the Crosby Street Hotel in SoHo. We've even started to get skeptical about their promised September 2009 opening.

But perhaps we should have a bit more faith. The Firmdale website still says September, and it's getting close enough for them to know whether a major delay will be happening (or so we like to believe). That, and the media is twittering with tidbits of information, like the fact that Jakob Hansen, currently general manager at one of Firmdale's London hotels, Charlotte Street, will be crossing the pond to take up the job at Crosby Street.

Once they've got Crosby Street up and running, the London-based Firmdale gang are planning to really take on New York — well, at least to open two more hotels in the city. Hopefully they won't take quite as long as the first one.

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Sniffing Around the Shell of the Crosby Street Hotel

Yesterday was a beautiful (albeit freezing cold) day for a little hotel construction reconnaissance, and so we quickly found ourselves staring up at the Soho shell which will eventually become the Crosby Street Hotel. Our last bit of news on the progress of this 85-room property, the first in America from the people behind London's popular SoHo Hotel, was to expect a September 2009 opening after originally being delayed from this month.

To this optimistic date, we say yeah, right. Seriously, by the looks of the site, they should have just gone for broke and given it until next winter, especially if they expect LEED Gold certification. Then, if they up the pace of construction and hit next September, everyone could be pleasantly surprised. Instead, with only the structure complete and no sign of interior life, we're preparing to be disappointed by another delay.

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Crosby Street Hotel Delayed Until September

Where: 270 Lafayette Street [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

Another day, another delayed NYC hotel. Sigh.

The Crosby Street Hotel is going to be the first American property from London-based Firmdale Hotels, the folks behind Covent Garden and the across-the-pond SoHo Hotel. The 85-room property was originally scheduled to open its doors in March, but a rep from the hotel had told us last time we got in touch that we could (more realistically) expect a Summer '09 opening. But we'd also found out that a liquor license had been approved already — so, you know, we had some faith.

Yet when we checked in on Firmdale's website, we found this: "Firmdale's next project is the Crosby Street Hotel due to open in New York's SoHo in September 2009." Oh noes.

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Firmdale's Crosby Street Hotel Opening in March of 2009

Where: 270 Lafayette St [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

This week we received an email from Firmdale Hotels giving us some more info on their Crosby Street Hotel which is now going to open in March of 2009, not at the end of 2008 as we had first thought.

CROSBY STREET HOTEL will be situated in SoHo between Prince, Spring and Lafayette. It is an all-new construction which will be built over eight 10 floors and will have 85 individually designed bedrooms and suites featuring floor-to-ceiling warehouse style windows.

The hotel's interior design will be done by Kit Kemp and the public spaces will include an outdoor garden, a guest drawing room, a gym and a 100-seat "state-of-the-art" screening theater, which is actually a Firmdale trademark feature.

There's not much to report on the individual guest rooms except that they will have flat-screen TVs, wireless internet, and CD/DVD players. Several one and two bedroom suites will be located on the top floors of the hotel.

The Crosby still plans on being green all over and is hoping to achieve the Gold LEED status with its construction. So now we just have to sit and wait.

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The Crosby Street Hotel: Both British and Green

Where: 270 Lafayette St [map], New York, ny, United States, 10012

The company behind London's new five-star Haymarket Hotel is coming to New York. The Crosby Street Hotel is set to open by the end of 2008 in SoHo on what is now a parking lot between Prince and Spring Streets. The hotel was predicted to open in '07 but not many hotels opened their doors this year. Next year, however, should be different.

Anyways, some good news for tree-hugging Anglophiles--the place is seeking a gold rating under LEED for new construction. The hotel will be eight stories with 75-rooms and will include such green features like:

efficient HVAC systems, locally-sourced building materials, wall-to-ceiling windows, and a roof garden.

Could this be an Orchard Garden Hotel of the East? We hope so but you know, much cooler.