Hotelier Sant Singh Chatwal is partnering with Starwood Hotels & Resorts to help market his most ambitious New York City property, The Chatwal, which opened last year on West 44th Street.

The posh hotel—room rates run upwards of $500 per night—announced last tuesday that it is now part of the Starwood Luxury Collection, giving it access to Starwood’s vast reservation system. There are more than 75 Luxury Collection hotels in 30 countries, but none had been in New York until The Chatwal.

“Our feeling is that Starwood will make a huge difference in boosting reservations and it will help us get a better room rate,” Mr. Chatwal said.

Mr. Chatwal is chairman and chief executive of Hampshire Hotels & Resorts, which owns about half a dozen budget hotels in New York City, as well as properties in Florida, England and India. His son, Vikram Chatwal, runs boutique hotels including Dream, Night and Time in New York, which are also owned by Hampshire Hotel & Resorts. Several weeks ago, Wyndham Worldwide inked a deal for the exclusive rights to franchise the three boutique hotels.

The Chatwal is the family’s priciest property to date. The 83-room hotel opened last September and boasts a spa and the Lambs Club restaurant, run by celebrity chef Geoffrey Zakarian. The landmark building was originally designed by noted architect Stanford White. Mr. Chatwal commissioned Thierry Despont to redesign the Art Deco interior, a renovation that took several years to complete.

A spokesman for Mr. Chatwal said the Starwood partnership is meant to boost the hotel’s visibility. It had been part of The Leading Hotels of the World, an organization that markets independently owned luxury properties.

Original plans called for an opening this month, but like many new hotel builds in NYC the opening of the Dream Downtown has been pushed back to the summer.

Already nicknamed the “cheesegrater” the Dream Downtown is right next to The Maritime Hotel, which sports a similar window-porthole design. If you can’t wait for the summer opening The Maritime will be a good alternative.

The website does not give much information and neither does the facebook page. However we know the Dream Downtown will have 316 “loft-inspired” bedrooms and a heated pool with translucent bottom visible from the ceiling of the lobby lounge. We have seen this already at the Axel Hotel in Buenos Aires! And though 316 rooms is not exactly boutique as the Dream Hotels’ website promises, we for sure think the Dream Downtown will be as sexy as its siblings uptown at Times Square, in Bangkok, Cochin (India) and the soon-to-open Dream South Beach in Miami (which partly operates as The Palmer House now).

Dream Hotels, owned by Vikram Chatwal (a well-known hotelier) and Wyndham Worldwide, one of the world’s largest hotel chains announced a joint-venture early this year to expand the Dream brand into other locations worldwide.

Wyndham Hotel Group announced it has entered into an agreement with Chatwal Hotels & Resorts, LLC, gaining exclusive rights to franchise and manage its Dream® and Night® boutique hotel brands globally.

Dream and Night hotels currently are open in New York; Bangkok, Thailand; and Cochin, India. In addition, the 108-room, Art-Deco-inspired Dream South Beach is scheduled to open early this year in Miami Beach adjacent to the former Versace Mansion on Collins Avenue. The company also has announced plans to open a Dream hotel in New York’s Meatpacking District during the second quarter of this year and expand in South Asia.

“The addition of the Dream and Night brands will complement Wyndham Hotel Group’s diverse brand portfolio which focuses on meeting guest needs with a hotel product for every kind of traveler,” said Eric Danziger, Wyndham Hotel Group president and chief executive officer. “These design-driven, destination-within-a-destination brands are favored by travelers who crave an avant-garde yet cosmopolitan experience. We are especially proud to work with Sant Singh Chatwal, an innovative hotelier and entrepreneur, to expand and evolve these brands in key business and leisure markets around the globe.”

Sant Singh Chatwal, chairman and chief executive officer of Chatwal Hotels & Resorts and its management arm, Hampshire Hotels & Resorts, said Wyndham Hotel Group will “take the development of the Dream and Night brands to the next level” by leveraging Wyndham’s global distribution system, Wyndham Rewards loyalty program and extended reach of development professionals. Chatwal Hotels & Resorts will continue to own the Dream and Night brand trademarks and intellectual property.

“The relationship with Wyndham will unlock the true potential of our Dream and Night brands, which have proven their success in key markets like New York and Bangkok during the last six years and are prime to further expand globally,” said Chatwal. “Working with industry colleagues like Eric to leverage Wyndham Hotel Group’s scale and reputation as a global brand leader will benefit the future of these inspired brands.”

The Night brand, which Wyndham plans to develop in primary and secondary markets, will be positioned as an ‘affordably chic’ hotel option featuring innovative designs and services such as guest deejays in lounges, discounts for green motorists with hybrid and electric cars and gourmet quick-serve food and beverage options.

Developers will be able to adapt the product to both full-service and limited-service models that offer a ground floor ‘living area’ with an attractive space for social interaction. The model also can be adapted to existing exterior-corridor hotels in prime locations.

The Dream brand is positioned as a full-service, lifestyle brand for gateway cities and resort destinations. The brand’s personality is light-hearted and fun, embracing the use of vivid visuals and trend-setting design. The progressive service offerings will emulate those of luxury hotels, but with a more relaxed point of view.

The Dream brand ethos is defined by its tagline “It’s your dream, we provide the room service.” Innovative and locally popular food and beverage offerings will be one of the brand’s core tenets and contribute to its appeal as the choice for customers seeking to add a little adventure to the demands of time away from home.

Dream and Night locations presently include the 216-room Dream New York at 210 W. 55th St. in midtown Manhattan; the 72-room urban Night Hotel at 132 W. 45th St. in Manhattan; the 195-room Dream Bangkok in the heart of Thailand’s capital city; and the 151-room Dream Cochin, located in Ernakulum City, the commercial capital of Kerala, India.

Wyndham Hotel Group is the world’s largest hotel company as measured by approximately 7,150 hotels and approximately 605,700 rooms under hotel brands such as Wyndham,  Ramada, Days Inn, Super 8, Wingate,  Baymont,  Microtel, Hawthorn Suites, TRYP, Howard Johnson, Travelodge and Knights Inn. In addition, the company has a license agreement to franchise the Planet Hollywood Hotels brand.

Chatwal Hotels & Resorts, headquartered in New York, owns and manages 10 hotels in New York, two in India, one in London and one in Bangkok. Chatwal Hotels & Resorts opened its first independent, four-star boutique hotel in New York in 1999, the Time Hotel at 49th Street and Broadway.