Need help planning NYC art museum trip

You might find this helpful: http://gonyc.about.com/cs/museums/a/museumdeals.htm

HTTY

IMHO the best times to visit New York in terms of weather are now through June and late Sept through Oct - but the latter is high season and much more expensive.

Although MoMA is midtown most of the art museums are uptown - Museum Mile on 5th Ave from Cooper Hewitt on down - as well as a scattering of others (Whitney, Asia Society etc) along with a scattering of very upscale galleries. Many more galleries are either downtown (Chelea, SoHo etc) and in Brooklyn (esp Dumbo).

So you can really stay anywhere and travel via subway.

There are a host of newer hotels all over the city and your budget will get you something pleasant this time of year - but might be a challenge in the fall. If it were me I would stay in one of the residential areas - for a more New York feel and better restaurant options that aren't sky high - than staying in midtown. Have a look at travelzoo or hotwire to see which hotels are offering deals.

As NYTraveler stated do ot overlook the galleries and I completely agree do not allow one museum to dictate where you stay. There are many museums and galleries on the East Side but the Met and the Chelsea galleries are on the west side.

The hottest area for new galleries is the East Village and the Lower East Side. The high rents and the recession have hurt many galleries in Chelsea, even though there are still scores of them.

Look at Time Out NY on line to see what is showing when you are in the City or buy the magazine.

Here are a few art supply stores you may find of interest.

Pearl on Canal Street. It is probably the largest art supply store on five or six floors with a wide selection of brushes and paints and everything else. The problem with Pearl is sometimes they have a cash flow problem and not everything is in stock. It is in Chinatown and just south of SOHO. It is still worth a trip.
http://www.pearlpaint.com/

Guerra Paint. This is only for the serious artist.
http://www.guerrapaint.com/

There are numerous other art supply stores such as Utrecht, Friedman, and Lee, which can find on the Net.

Also be sure to stop at Rizzoli's. It is not only a beautiful bookstore but probably has the best selection of art and architecture books.

http://www.rizzoliusa.com/

And one of NY's great treasures The Strand Book Store

http://www.strandbooks.com/

More later.

A new AIA guide to NYC has been released. It is expensive and heavy. The sense of style in NYC has changed dramatically in many neighborhoods in 25 years. I suggest you secure a copy from your library and see which old and new buildings may interest you.

Among the ones I find interesting are the new Cooper Union Building and a condo on Bond Street. The egomanical Frank Gehry has two buildings of interest. The tallest residence in the country resides downtown by City Hall and a residence along side the High Line. The perspectives, textures, colors, and angles from the High Line are most intriguing. Highly recommended.

http://www.thehighline.org/

There are hundreds of wonderful inexpensive restaurants throughout the city but few near MoMA. Much has been written about restaurants on these boards. If you go to the box at top of this page titled "View By State" and click on NY, you will see detailed informations and various opinions.

The value of the New York pass is relative. Some of the museums offered by the pass are "suggested admission"/pay-what-you-wish at all times. And most museums have a free evening. Plus you have to see many museums in a short amount of time to get full value. It would be best for you to consider which museums you want to visit and what their actual admission costs are. Here's a list that may be helpful:

http://www.ny.com/museums/free.html

Also note that there are other deals around, like the combo ticket for Top of the Rock and MoMA that offers significant savings.

I love staying at the Milburn Hotel at 76th and Broadway, on the Upper West Side. You can walk across Central Park to all the major museums on 5th Avenue or to MOMA and the galleries on the UWS. If you stay a week, they'll reduce the rate a bit for you, and it will be within your budget. The rooms have a fridge and microwave, and you can go one block to the Fairway market and get good food for snacks or light meals. They also provide a continental breakfast and free computer use. There's a major bus line on the corner as well as subway near by.

Great links and ideas. I'd not heard about the High Line, and the art supply and book stores suggestions are marvelous - thanks.

I was surprised at the big difference in hotel prices from mid-sept to mid-oct, though it's logical. The Milburn looks good (thx, nancy), and I also noticed people seem to like the Hampton Inn Times Square. I need to get my head around "mid-town" and "up-town" and "upper-west-side" ...

Again, thanks for jump-starting my planning. It always feels a bit daunting at the beginning, then things tend to fall into place.

The last week in August and the first week in Sept. before Labor Day are usually good times for hotel bargains. After Labor Day hotel prices really get crazy.

The bulk of the museums are on the upper east side and while there are not many hotels there and most of them are pricey, the Affinia Gardens is one I'd consider. It sits on the edge of midtown and the upper east side so convenient to both and like the Milburn is a suite hotel so most if not all rooms have kitchens and a bit more space. It's much fresher/recently renovated than the Milburn which is looking pretty tired. Affinia.com Another option in that area but futther uptown is the Marmara hotel, also suites and more like serviced apartments. http://www.marmara-manhattan.com/index.html

If you'd rather be further downtown, www.chelsealodgesuites.com is an idea or in the village west-eleventh.com I agree staying in midtown is not really necessary unless you plan on doing a lot of theater.

I think once you wrap your mind around when you're coming and where you want to stay, there'll be plenty of time to deal with restaurants.

Here's another list of pay what you wish/free information on museums. http://www.newyorkology.com/archives/museums/index.php

Midtown is primarily a business district that runs from 59th Street down to 34 th ST (or 23rd St) for some people. Also has Times Square/theater district and many of the traditional department stores.

Uptown runs from 59th St up to 125th St and includes Central park as well as the upper east and west sides. Many of the museums are on the east side of the park - but there are fewer hotels there and they tend to be more upscale (beyond your budget) since this much is a VERY upscale residential area. the west side has some museums next to the park, as well as Lincoln Center, and is primarily mid and upscale residential. An easy walk or bus ride across the park (10 to 5 minutes) to many east side museums. Also a ton of inexpensive/moderate restaurants of every possible ethnicity (much better selection that Times Square).

Downtown is a bunch of different neighborhoods below 34th - or 23rd St. Mostly mid but also some upscale residential plus businesses and shopping areas with lots of clubs and restaurants. Some areas have lots of galleries, some lots of offices, some mostly residential. (Below this is the government center - with City Hall, court houses, etc and the financial district/Wall Street area.)

Check the benefits of your hometown museum membership. It may include a reciprocal arrangement that will allow you free admission to cooperating institutions, including a number of New York museums. If it does, remember to bring your card!

Good point, kmbp. I'll check. Meanwhile, DH is tasked with selecting which museums and which traveling exhibits, when. (Some exhibits, we can see locally when they come to San Francisco.)

I'm getting a much better idea of the geography of NYC. It was the 80s when I last visited, and it felt like a pretty scarey place with many areas you did not approach. (Hence my angst about where to stay.)

And, yes, plenty of time to consider where to eat ... but, you can see where MY interest falls!

A few additional points to remember - the most direct subway line from uptown to downtown is from the east side. If you take your time in each museum you might want to stay on the West side with a short walk across the park to the uptown, east side museums. If you are more galleries and small museums and quick through the large museums, you might consider staying downtown.

Along the upper east side, museum mile, is the MET, the Frick and the Guggenheim and the Neue (don't miss this little gem)among a couple of others. If you are interested in Asian art, the Asia Society is fabulous and has reciprocity with SF. If you like modern also look into the Guggenheim. The NYC public library, Morgan Library and Folk Art Museum also has wonderful exhibits. Check out to see if they are of interest on the days you are in the city.

A must is to check out each museum website for exhibitions and free admission days. You can spend a month in NYC and not see all the museums, but if you plan ahead, you will see what interests you most.

The gallery guide is another resource that hasn't been mentioned.

http://www.artinfo.com/ggsearch?title=&field_specialties_tid=&ai_location_country=us&ai_location_province=NY&ai_location_city=3298&ai_location_neighborhood=0

There are free tours of New York. I took the six-hour one last year and had a wonderful and funny tour guide:

http://www.freetoursbyfoot.com/new-york-tours/default.asp


If you do select a hotel on the Upper West Side, there are also what are known as "crosstown buses" which cross Central Park from the West side to the East side - this is an especially good thing if you don't want to walk through Central Park late at night or don't want to do several transfers on the Metro.

If you want to find lodging on the Upper East Side with its dearth of hotels and where a number of the major museums are located, try airbnb. Look for something close to a metro station and which has several reviews. Shop airbnb with care!

Have a great trip!

There are many museums from about East 70 Street and up on 5th Avenue. There is a 5th Avenue bus. I read about (never stayed) a B&B called Stay the Night. Think it was on East 96 Street. Also, check broadwaybox.com. Saw something re Art Gallery Tours/Walks.

Have a good time.

Yes, the city has changed a *lot* since the 80's!! You may find it virtually unrecognizable - especially how clean and secure basically all of Manhattan is compared to back then. Times Square is a tourist-filled pedestrian zone; much of Broadway from 57th Street to 14th Street has a lane or two of traffic set aside as pedestrian-only; Bryant Park on 42nd Street is a lovely green postage-stamp oasis where it used to be unapproachable; Hell's Kitchen is full of nice restaurants and Alphabet City is home to more of the affluent than the poor.

The subway, too, while a far cry from BART, is so much nicer and easier to navigate than back in the day. (Note I didn't say *easy*, just easiER!) There are also some great navigation tools now, from hopstop.com to google maps directions. Especially on the weekends, make sure to check the "planned service" changes identified on www.mta.info. If you do visit for a week, you can each get a 7-day pass good for all subways and city buses.

For those reasons, I wouldn't worry too much about staying in one neighborhood over another. You could even stay in Brooklyn or Long Island City Queens, and still have good access where you want to go. I too would recommend looking at Airbnb, with the caveat that the more reviews - and good reviews - the better for these spaces.

// For art, if you do decide to visit in the fall, there is the annual DUMBO Arts Festival. The DUMBO neighborhood just over the bridge into Brooklyn used to be all artists studios. These days, it's a mix of creative industries (artists, web startups, design firms, etc.) and upscale housing, but is still fun to check out on one end or another of walking over the Brooklyn Bridge, and there's some good eats there. This link will be updated with 2012 information closer to the date: http://dumboartsfestival.com/

Am thinking galleries are indeed a great resource to look into given your interests.

There are of course scads of excellent art museums in Manhattan and the outer boroughs, and you could easily fill your week and then some seeing them. Have been to all these listed, more or less in descending order of how strongly I'd recommend them:

Metropolitan Museum of Art
Museum of Modern Art
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Frick Collection
The Cloisters
Brooklyn Museum of Art
Museum of Arts and Design
American Folk Art Museum
Neue Galerie New York
Asia Society
New-York Historical Society (yes, they have art here)
Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
Isamu Noguchi Garden Museum
Studio Museum in Harlem
New Museum of Contemporary Art
P.S. 1 Contemporary Art Center
El Museo del Barrio
Cooper-Hewitt National Design Museum
Socrates Sculpture Park
Scandinavia House
Queens Museum of Art

Have not been to the Rubin Museum of Art or Bronx Museum of the Arts, which are yet other options.

Is there some reason a year old post has been resurrected? Did someone whose post was removed top this one?