Le Bain sits on top of the Standard, High Line in the Meatpacking District and is, depending on the hour, two entirely different venues. From four in the afternoon it is a rooftop bar with one of the best westward views in Manhattan. From about eleven at night it is a penthouse discothèque with a plunge pool in the middle of the dance floor. Most people only ever experience the second one, and the first is better.
A club that opens in the afternoon is two completely different venues in one room, and most people only ever see the second one. Ask Karpo what the queue looks like and whether the rooftop is open.
The hours are the whole strategy
Monday and Tuesday it runs 4pm to midnight. Wednesday through Friday, 4pm to 4am. Saturday, 2pm to 4am. Sunday, 2pm to midnight.
Doors at four on a weekday and two at the weekend are the detail almost nobody uses. Those are the sunset sessions, and in a west-facing room above the Hudson, sunset is the product.
Arriving at five in the afternoon means walking in without a queue, choosing where to sit, and watching the light go down over New Jersey. Arriving at midnight means a line downstairs and a door policy.
The pool, the rooftop and the crêperie
The plunge pool set into the dance floor is the thing people know about the venue and it is real. It is small, it is not a swimming pool in any useful sense, and whether anybody is in it depends entirely on the night.
In summer, the rooftop above the club is covered in artificial grass and runs a crêperie, which is a genuinely strange combination and one of the more charming things available in Manhattan at two in the morning. That programming is seasonal, so it is worth confirming.
The rooftop is also where the view is. The indoor room has windows; the roof has the whole thing, and on a warm evening that is where everyone sensible is.
The door, and how to deal with it
This is a hotel penthouse and access is controlled. Late at night, on a weekend, the queue is long and the door is selective in the way that Meatpacking District doors have been for twenty years.
The reliable ways around that are the ones that do not involve arguing at the rope: arrive early, go on a weeknight, or be a guest of the hotel. The first of those is free and works every time.
Dress is smart-casual in the Manhattan sense — nobody is checking for a jacket, but beach clothes and athletic gear will not get you upstairs on a Saturday night.
What it costs
Drinks are priced as hotel-rooftop drinks, which is to say high. There is no way around that and it is the trade for the view and the room.
The afternoon session is where the value is. The same drink at five in the afternoon buys you two hours of the best light in the city and a seat; the same drink at one in the morning buys you a spot in a crowd.
Table service and bottle arrangements exist and are the standard late-night mechanism for guaranteeing space. If you are a group of six on a Saturday, that is effectively the only way to sit down.
Where it sits in the neighbourhood
The Meatpacking District has changed enormously since this hotel opened, and the High Line runs directly beneath the building, which makes the approach on foot from Chelsea unusually good. Walking the High Line down and going straight up is the correct arrival.
The neighbourhood below is dense with restaurants at every price point, so dinner before is easy and dinner after is possible. It is also close enough to the West Village that the night has somewhere quieter to end.
And because the club runs to four in the morning midweek, it functions as a last stop as well as a first one, which few rooftops in this city do.
One thing worth understanding about the building is why the view works the way it does. The Standard straddles the High Line on concrete legs, which puts the top floor high above a stretch of the West Side where almost nothing else is tall, so the sight lines west across the Hudson are unobstructed in a way they would not be twenty blocks north.
That also means the sunset is genuinely the event rather than a nice detail. From roughly an hour before it until half an hour after, the room does something no other club in Manhattan can, and then it becomes a very good but more ordinary nightclub.
In winter the calculation changes, because sunset arrives at half past four and the rooftop is less usable. That is the season to go indoors and late rather than outdoors and early.
Practical notes
Le Bain, at the top of the Standard, High Line in the Meatpacking District. Open 4pm to midnight Monday and Tuesday, 4pm to 4am Wednesday to Friday, 2pm to 4am Saturday, and 2pm to midnight Sunday. Doors open early for sunset sessions and that is the best and easiest time to go — no queue, a choice of seats, and a west-facing view over the Hudson. A plunge pool sits in the dance floor; in summer the rooftop above runs a crêperie on artificial grass. The late-night door is selective and the queue is long; drinks are priced accordingly. The High Line runs directly below the building.
Tags: #lebain #bestclubsnyc #meatpackingdistrict #thestandard #rooftopnyc #nycnightlife #highline #nycclubs #sunsetnyc #hudsonriver #nightoutnyc #manhattannightlife #rooftopbar #nycguide
Please drink responsibly. Must be of legal drinking age.
All trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
Ask Karpo first
This is a rooftop bar in the afternoon and a nightclub after eleven, and only one of those has a queue. Ask Karpo whether the rooftop is open right now, what the door looks like tonight, and where to eat in the Meatpacking District beforehand.
