The Fifth Avenue Hotel opened in autumn 2023 on the north-west corner of Fifth Avenue and West 28th Street, inside the limestone, brick and terra-cotta bank that McKim, Mead & White designed in 1907 for the Second National Bank. That bank had started out inside the original Fifth Avenue Hotel, Amos Eno's 1850s palace on Madison Square between 23rd and 24th Streets, so the building and the name already shared a history. Alex Ohebshalom's Flâneur Hospitality spent ten years restoring it and raising a 23-storey tower behind it on West 28th Street, with Martin Brudnizki on the interiors.
There are 152 rooms, and the split between the two buildings matters. The bank, which the hotel calls the Mansion, holds only suites: 21 of them, plus the Flâneur Penthouse, a rebuilt rooftop floor with a 900 sq ft (84 m²) wraparound terrace. Everything else is in the tower. The NoMad Queen is 225 sq ft (21 m²), the City King, NoMad King and NoMad Twin run 285 to 300 sq ft (26 to 28 m²), and the Grand King and Corner King reach 375 sq ft (35 m²). Each has a marble bathroom with a walk-in shower and a Maxibar whose snacks and soft drinks are free. Soaking tubs and heated floors begin with the Mansion Suites at 575 sq ft (53 m²).
What it is chosen for is how completely the new hotel passes for an old one. Brudnizki dressed the public rooms as a Gilded Age house that has been collecting for a century: peacock sconces, black lacquered cabinets of curiosities in the lobby, Murano chandeliers, mirrored ceilings. Café Carmellini fills the double-height banking hall with two sculptural trees, sapphire velvet booths and balcony tables, and Andrew Carmellini's Italian and French cooking took it to No. 39 on North America's 50 Best Restaurants in 2025. The Portrait Bar, panelled and hung with paintings around a carved stone fireplace, is a lounge for guests from 8am to 5pm before it opens to the city. The MICHELIN Guide gave the hotel Two Keys in 2024 and kept them in its 2026 selection.
The trade is that the old building is the expensive part. At the entry price you sleep in the tower, in 225 sq ft, and the first room in the old bank is a suite at well over twice the rate. There is no spa or pool, only a 24-hour gym and passes to Life Time Fitness. What every guest gets is generous: butler service, a house car from 8am to 3pm and twice-daily housekeeping. Book it to eat, drink and sleep in a hotel that already behaves like an institution. Skip it for a spa weekend.
