Hotel Chelsea bar: the Lobby Bar until 2am, and the 3 counters beside it

The Lobby Bar has its own number on the street, 226, and the hotel’s dining page places it beside the lobby and calls it a grand-hotel bar with «a hedonic atmosphere». It is written for «hotel guests and neighbors alike». The drink the hotel puts first is The 1884 Martini: gin, Cedro lemon, vetiver and Spanish olive oil. The list goes on to what the bar calls tributes, Arnaud’s French 75 among them, and to drinks without alcohol such as a Strawberry Sbagliato; there are wine, beer and sake, a spirits list, and small plates and desserts to go with them.

Until 2022 these rooms were used for storage, Condé Nast Traveler writes in an undated review of the bar. There are several of them: a bar room with an inlaid ceiling, vintage chandeliers and velvet sofas, and a solarium floored in what the magazine calls ketchup-and-mustard checkered tile. Its critic found the cocktail list «extensive (and expensive)», picked out a Cowboy Mouth 3.0 made with fig leaf and pecan and a Naked Lunch with oakmoss and rhubarb amaro, and judged the food enough for dinner: a burger, sandwiches, and oysters dressed as a dirty martini.

The tributes go back to the opening. In its issue of 1–14 August 2022, New York Magazine reported that Brian Evans, then director of bars for the Sunday Hospitality group, had put the Dukes martini of London first in that section: prepared at the table, the gin and the vodka each kept in a block of ice, the spirit neither stirred nor shaken. In 2022 it cost $26, and the bar allowed each guest 2 of them in an evening; nothing read today says whether the price or the limit still holds. The hotel keeps a copy of the article on its own site.

The bar’s page prints no menu and no price. Guests fill the gap. One wrote in October 2023 that the lobby bar was «$35/drink pre tax and tip». Another, in August 2026, after 5 nights in July with 2 visits to «the expansive bar» and a dinner in the café, wrote of «$32 cocktails» and a $34 cheeseburger without saying which room poured the $32; the cheeseburger on Café Chelsea’s menu is $34 and its dearest cocktail $22. The restaurants under the same roof do post their lists. At El Quijote the house cocktails are $18 and the «thrown» ones, a Sherry Martini among them, $20. At Café Chelsea cocktails run from $18 to $22 and a Kronenbourg is $9. At Teruko the house cocktails cost $21 to $25, the Teruko Highball among the dearest, and a Kirin Ichiban is $12.

Each of those 3 has a counter you can simply walk up to. El Quijote, which the hotel describes as a century-old Spanish restaurant and cocktail lounge, keeps its bar first come, first served, with the full dinner menu; its page quotes Patti Smith, «The Chelsea was my home and the El Quijote was my bar». Café Chelsea and Teruko say the same of their bars. Teruko’s, down in the basement, is built round the original back bar of the Orchid Bar at the Hotel Okura in Tokyo, salvaged before that hotel was renovated.

People who came only for a drink describe a welcome. A couple who were not staying, in a review of September 2025, arrived early on a Monday, found the Lobby Bar quiet, heard the building’s history from the bartender over an 1884 Martini and the house French 75, and stayed for a second round. A visitor in June 2026 «only went to the bar» and resolved to book a room next time. Another, in a 3-star review of September 2025, thought the service and food «ok… nothing exceptional» and regretted what the renovation had done to the interiors. 2 guests whose rooms were not ready at check-in, in reviews of July and September 2026, were handed vouchers for a drink at the bar.

Bemelmans at The Carlyle is the bar with music every night, and a cover charge once the pianist starts at 5.30pm. Peacock Alley at the Waldorf Astoria turns from lounge to cocktail bar at 5pm and can be reserved on Resy. The Jazz Club under Aman New York is an evening booked ahead, with a door of its own on West 56th Street.