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MR & MRS MORGAN
She appreciates art, spas and salads; he obsesses about football, Twitter and carbs. Is there anything they agree about at The Carlyle?
ANDREW CROWLEY; DAN GOLDSMITH/SCOPFEATURES
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SHE SAYS
ook up as much as you can,â€? one New Yorker once urged me, “but for God’s sake, don’t ever look down.â€? Clearly this guy has never seen the view from the Empire Suite at The Carlyle hotel. From the lofty conďŹ nes of the 2,600sqft duplex – occupying half of the 28th and 29th oors of the recently renovated art-deco hotel – I’m rather enjoying looking down. I’m high up enough to be spared sightings of the city’s miniature schnauzer-sized rats, but the afuent inhabitants of Manhattan’s gold coast remain just visible, pleasing pinpricks beneath me. There are penthouses overlooking Central Park that I never imagined existed, castles on rooftops and, above Madison Avenue, two people are exchanging their wedding vows 50 oors high in the sky. “Isn’t that the most romantic thing you’ve ever seen?â€? I sigh from behind the antique telescope provided in the ďŹ rst of our two sitting rooms. My husband grunts. I know that grunt. It’s the grunt of a man checking out technological artillery. The grunt of a man staring at one of our nine (yes, nine) at-screen TVs, with a remote control in each hand. I throw him an accusatory look. “It is romantic,â€? he assures me, icking through the sports channels. I spot iridescent black beads at the corners of his mouth, blini crumbs on the art-deco coffee table and what I suspect is a half-ďŹ nished glass of our complimentary champagne. “Did you start the Beluga and vintage Dom without me?â€? He knows distraction tactics are the only resort after a faux pas of this magnitude. “Did you check out the Cubist paintings upstairs?â€? he stammers. “And don’t forget we’ve got our spa treatments later‌â€? My husband doesn’t care about either of these things, but he caught me admiring the art earlier and he knows I can’t wait to be turned into a Park Lane Princess by some dulcet-toned aesthetician. A 90-minute Sisley intense-hydration facial with Antonina Dutu, the hotel’s lead therapist, leaves me feeling just that. I’ve got their expensive-looking skin ($325 worth), the kind where the pores themselves appear to have been sieved out. I’ve developed their attitude, too. I want to go and bark at shop assistants on Fifth, complain about the size of the olives in my dirty martini down at the legendary Belemans Bar and move a salad around my plate at the new Upper East Side hotspot Salumeria Rosi Parmacotto. Of course the salad was never going to happen – not with the husband’s carbicidal tendencies. Three hours, two tasting menus and a Tums tablet later, I am lying on my 2,000-threadcount Frette sheets thinking how worrying it is that, after the initial kick, extreme luxury just feels right. It seems natural, and so right, for there to be a box of LadurĂŠe macaroons on my bedside table, a monogrammed pillow beneath my head and an extensive breakfast menu ticked and hanging on our front door. But my husband’s freakishly smooth skin? I won’t tell him, but that feels wrong on pretty much every level.
A “Watching my daughter munching on her first caviar blini in her bespoke Elise robe made me laugh out loud� Piers
Celia Walden and Piers Morgan stayed at The Carlyle, New York (001 212 744 1600, rosewoodhotels.com). The Empire Suite costs from $15,000 (about ÂŁ9,800) per night.
HE SAYS
s someone who once spent two years living at the Beverly Wilshire in Los Angeles, I consider myself something of a “details manâ€? when it comes to hotels. As with cars, women and houses, they need to tick all the right boxes to have any chance of longevity. (I actually used that phrase when announcing to friends, in front of Celia, two days after our first date, that I was going to marry her. She called it “the most repugnant phrase I’ve ever heardâ€? but walked down the aisle four years later.) Give me a spacious, clean, quiet suite with super-fast service and working gadgets and I’m happy. Substitute cramped surroundings, dirt, delays on the breakfast order (when Celia’s early-morning sugar levels are already low), no internet signal or, God forbid, a broken TV remote and I quickly resemble Michael Douglas in Falling Down. The Carlyle’s absurdly luxurious three-bedroom Empire Suite ticked just about every box imaginable. Watching my 15-month-old daughter munching gluttonously on her ďŹ rst (complimentary) caviar blini, while wearing her bespoke robe embroidered with “ELISEâ€? (mine had my Twitter address @piersmorgan – now that’s what I call detail‌) made me laugh out loud. As did the motorised loo seats that both warmed and rose at the ick of a switch. The nine TVs, Apple computer and giant telescope were all entertaining diversions from my wife’s pseudo-Brian Sewell impression as she studied the impressive art and dementedly recited the spa menu. Ah, yes, the spa. I’ll confess, I hate the damn things. I see no real joy in sitting for 90 minutes, listening to Belgian airport music, while someone cracks my scapulas. But I subjected myself to a hammam. It didn’t hurt, and I whiled away the time silently choosing my all-time-great left-footed Arsenal team, so not entirely squandered. “Your skin will feel amazing,â€? said my therapist. Like I cared‌ For dinner, we ventured to Salumeria Rosi Parmacotto, a few blocks away, on the recommendation of actor Josh Charles from The Good Wife. “Best food in New York,â€? he ventured, “and best-kept secret.â€? Celia tried to order a salad, but I was having none of it. Instead I ordered us baked oysters, octopus, bresaola, rigatone and eggplant, roasted scallops, chef/owner Cesare Casella’s signature pork chops, beef tenderloin, and a variety of exquisitely cooked mushrooms, Brussels sprouts, Tuscan fries and beans, followed by a Limoncello dessert and Italian cheeses. It’s a fabulous menu. Trust me, I ate it all. Later, in bed, Celia murmured: “My God, your skin feels extraordinary‌â€? I still didn’t care. (You think Clark Gable ever cared about his skin?) But I did care about the pillows, which were – unlike the sumptuous bed itself – hard and uncomfortable. A ďŹ rm non-box-ticking offence in my book. However, as Salvador Dali said: “Have no fear of perfection; you’ll never reach it.â€? The Carlyle tries very hard.
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