Freehand captures everything travellers come to New York for, under one well-designed, well-priced roof. It’s a given that young visitors to New York don’t want to blow their budget on a fancy hotel room. Better to book something that’s at least clean, comfortable, and strategically located, and spend the extra cash on that restaurant everyone has been talking about. Freehand takes this compromise and somehow manages to make it feel sexy and stylish. Rooms, including queens, kings, and bunk rooms for four, are basic—verging on dorm-like—but brightened up with artwork that sometimes snakes across the walls and ceilings.
Like the model that Ian Schrager engineered with Morgans Hotel in the 1980s, here it’s all about the public spaces, which the design studio Roman and Williams filled with glossy tiles, dark woods, and walls in deep turquoise, with quirky touches such as sheepskin rugs and plants in mismatched ceramic pots. Most importantly, there’s a feast of food and drink options: an outpost of award-winning cocktail joint Broken Shaker on the roof; a to-go counter off the lobby, an offshoot of downtown favorite breakfast spot The Smile; and two restaurants and another bar from Gabriel Stulman, of the West Village’s Bar Sardine.
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