New York's Best 100 Little Hotels 4th Edition by Allen Sperry, Rizzoli International Press

Many years ago the Lower east Side was the first stop for Jewish immigrants coming to the New World. Once an area of tenement houses, push carts, cobblestone streets, foreign dialects, and dreams of a better lie, the hip and happening Lower East Side of today bears little resemblance to the sepia-toned vision we have of this area in the early part of the last century. These days the pickle purveyors, bagel bakeries and garment shops have given way to designer handbag boutiques, high-end champagne bars, and jewelry emporiums selling pricey baubles to the faux slumming hordes from uptown. In New York parlance this is gentrification at work - a neighborhood in transition.

Standing among these cultural and economic crosscurrents is the Blue Moon Hotel, a paen to the area's bygone era, located in an updated and renovated 1879 tenement house. Named after a resort the owner's family managed on Coney Island long ago, the Blue Moon is one of the few boutique hotels in this part of town and certainly the only hotel that embraces and celebrates its humble origins at the same time.

The hotel has been meticulously renovated with inspired artistic touches and architectual and ornamental details salvaged from the original structure. The lobby is done up in period furniture and the walls are lined with collages made from old magazines and artifacts from Lower east Side history. Be sure to note the original banisters and wainscoting and the pre-WWI Coca-Cola vending machine. This is hotel as museum - old world charm to attract leisure travelers seeking a cultural experience. Bedrooms befit an eclectic bohemian with a trust fund - stylish but with a slacker's edge. The Blue Moon may not be the last word in luxury, but it is clearly a labor of love and its off-beat quirkiness has a special charm. The Lower East Side is definitely one of the more exciting and dynamic areas of Manhattan these days and is certainly worth visiting even if you don't want to stay there. However, if you want to be located where you can put one foot in New York's past and one foot in New York's future, the Blue Moon is a great place to stay.