This chic downtown hotel features 86 individually designed guestrooms and suites, all with floor-to-ceiling windows, original artwork and a stylish contemporary design. Guests also enjoy the leafy garden, the private screening room and a whimsically designed bar. The hotel is beautifully located on a cobblestone street just a short stroll from the great dining and shopping in Soho and Nolita.

New York hotels don't come too much classier than this 1927 landmark building, set on a leafy street in one of the Upper East Side's most fashionable spots. Discreet and aristocratic, the liveried doormen escort you to opulent rooms crammed with period furniture and antique décor. It manages to retain an understated air, though, and is the ultimate retreat for those that can afford it.

This hip downtown spot fills a renovated historic building in the Tribeca neighbourhood. From the eclectic lobby with its comfy chairs and imported Moroccan screens, to the luxurious bathrooms featuring Carrara marble and hand-laid Turkish tiles, you'll feel a rich combination of style and decadence.

This sleek, contemporary hotel is well located in Little Italy, at the border with Chinatown, and boasts relatively spacious (for New York) guestrooms with hardwood floors, patterned walls and large flat-screen TVs. There's a rooftop terrace with great views, and an Asian restaurant downstairs.

Not far from the much-photographed Flatiron Building is The Evelyn, set in a historic building that has housed one hotel after the other since 1905. Recently renovated rooms feature soft cocoa colour schemes, crisp white linens and spacious bathrooms, and the location is superbly central.

There is nothing traditional about The Paramount, a post-modern showplace. For example, in the entrance, red roses are displayed vertically in vases set into the wall. The lobby bar, designed by Philippe Starck, has platinum walls and a glamorous staircase sweeping up to the mezzanine. Guests can gaze down from their tables to the music and theatre industry leaders reclining on the slightly off-kilter furniture below.

This small hotel – there are just 13 rooms - is popular for its keen pricing and convenient location near the transit hub of Penn Station. The simple rooms feature a splashy image on one wall and offer varying bed configurations, but only feature sinks – bathrooms are shared. They do have minifridges, though.

For an affordable stay in a great downtown location, it's hard to top the Jane. Rooms are clean if decidedly small and play off a nautical theme. Those used to life at sea won't mind the 'cabins', which are a mere 5sq m (50sq ft) in size. The bigger 'Captain's Cabins' are roomier at 23sq m (250sq ft) and have flat-screen TVs and iPod docks.

A somewhat divisive 'art' hotel that lots of people really love for its location and pricing, but which you're going to dislike if you're humourless, or are a stickler for high levels of cleanliness. The rooms are individually designed with striking, and sometimes shocking, motifs, and the casual air recalls a backpacker's hostel but with individual rooms. Bohemian, definitely.