May brings thousands of visitors to New York City for art and design fairs and related events. The largest and most established include two major art fairs, Frieze New York (Thursday through Sunday), and TEFAF New York (Friday through Tuesday), the NYCxDesign Festival (May 15-21), the International Contemporary Furniture Fair (May 18-20) and a new design fair, Shelter by Afternoon Light (May 17-19).
But fairs and galleries aren’t the only places to see remarkable design in the city. Restaurants, for example, have become as serious about design as they are about the food (and sometimes even more so). Hundreds of dining establishments opened last year in New York City, many of them featuring impressive art, flattering lighting, high-end finishes and furnishings and, of course, at least a few Instagram-worthy backdrops.
The ones highlighted below have opened in the past year. They were not chosen for their culinary or cocktail offerings but for their standout design, with interiors that are intriguing and engaging. Some were designed by professionals, others by industry veterans taking matters into their own hands, and one by a film industry power couple. Scoring a coveted reservation during a time when leagues of art and design types flood the city will probably not be easy, but a curious visitor might be allowed to pop in for a peek.
This intimate bar above Daniel Humm’s Eleven Madison Park has garnered buzz for its original art, created by the man for whom it was named, Francesco Clemente. But it was Brad Cloepfil of Allied Works, the architect responsible for the 2017 redesign of the three-Michelin-starred restaurant, and Rachel Massey, his associate principal, director of interior design, who created the interiors.
When Humm approached Cloepfil about designing a bar for Clemente’s works, he cited Kronenhalle, an elegant, old soul of an establishment in Zurich, as potential inspiration. Kronenhalle’s restaurant has wood-paneled walls clad with pieces by the likes of Marc Chagall and Joan Miró.
“I wanted to make a single wood room that was very special,” said Cloepfil, ”and I didn’t want it to feel designed, as much as made.”
He got his wish. Clemente Bar is cocooned in laser-cut walnut panels accessorized by small medallions that were hand carved in the Allied Works studio. The largest piece of furniture in the room is a vintage Italian banquette that perfectly fit where it needed to, with no alterations required.
Most of the remaining furniture pieces were commissioned from Brett Robinson, a designer who lives and works in Los Angeles, who created stone-topped tables, bar stools and ottomans with custom metal finishes. The artist Carsten Höller created custom sconces as well as table lamps that look like melted mushrooms.
Second floor, Eleven Madison Park, 11 Madison Avenue (24th Street), clementebar.com.
Soso’s
Most of the eateries on this list feature interiors created by accomplished architects and-or interior designers. Soso’s does not. It is the creation of the owners, Eddy Buckingham and Jeff Lam, partners in Tuxedo Hospitality (who also own Chinese Tuxedo, an atmospheric eatery off a windy alleyway in Chinatown).
“We wanted to create something that was really good without a lot of pretense,” said Buckingham. “We’re leaning into a feeling of nostalgia as social and civic and fun.”
Every table in the wood-paneled dining room is a booth, upholstered in a colorful vinyl patchwork inspired by 1970s tote bags. Those colors informed the rest of the space, from floor tiles to the vintage Helena Tynell pendants and sconces, as well as the candy colored panes set into a shelf above the bar. And the exterior windows are in different shapes and sizes that, Buckingham said, he hopes makes the room “look like an art installation from the street.”
191 Centre Street (Hester Street), sosos.nyc.
Printemps
The New York City outpost of the Parisian fashion retailer with a dedicated following — the only location in the United States — debuted in March to great fanfare, with lines around the block, and four drinking or dining options (a fifth, Maison Passerelle, opened a couple weeks ago). Salon Vert, a raw bar on the second floor that also serves a small selection of other foods, is particularly inviting; its design, as well as all the interiors of the two-level 55,000 square foot store, was entrusted to Laura Gonzalez, an interior designer who lives and works in Paris, who also has a showroom in TriBeCa.
Gonzalez said in an interview that she envisioned Salon Vert as a blend of “femininity and greenery.” The floor is a grid of green stone. Curvaceous shelves she described as “lily pads” float on wood-clad “tree” columns. The back of the bar is covered in bespoke tiles bearing the image of a, aptly, a calla lily. A lengthy banquette is upholstered in verdant Pierre Frey fabric. A fresco hand-painted by David Roma floats around the entire space. And a flock of origami birds, created by the Belgian artist Charles Kaisin, is suspended from the ceiling.
“I think it is good to bring life inside retail,” Gonzalez said. “You come, you can have a coffee. Or you can just buy a lipstick and go home.”
1 Wall Street (Broadway), US.Printemps.com.
Manuela
Nine years ago the first Manuela restaurant opened in Downtown Los Angeles inside the then-Hauser Wirth & Schimmel (now Hauser & Wirth) gallery complex, which — in addition to the art gallery — housed a garden and bookstore. Last fall brought the debut of Manuela in New York City.
Like its West Coast sibling, the Manuela in SoHo draws diners with millions of dollars worth of art, functional and otherwise. There’s a table designed and made by Rashid Johnson in the private dining room (set with vintage Cassina Cab 413 chairs by Mario Bellini and lit by Massimo Vignelli Sigaro pendant lamps), and, in the main dining room, tables by Mary Heilmann, chairs by Matthew Day Jackson and a light sculpture (above the bar) as well as smaller table lamps in the form of mushrooms (on the bar) by Mika Rottenberg.
One might wonder why an interior designer was necessary? To help make all of the above happen.
“A lot of what we do behind the scenes is incredibly technical, to support the artists so they don’t have to think about any of that,” said Russell Sage, an interior designer who has worked with the Wirths on several hospitality projects, including the SoHo Manuela. “I’m looking at it through the lens of ‘will this still be perfect in five or 10 years’ time?’”
This meant reinforcing walls so they could bear the weight of a Louise Bourgeois “Spider II” sculpture and floors to hold Johnson’s table (a street-facing window had to be removed to bring it in). But it also meant working with Heilmann’s team to create tables that could accommodate a table setting, and helping Rottenberg find and kiln dry some of the vines used in her sculptural lighting creation.
“Everything looks new, whether it’s new or old,” said Sage. “And that’s important.”
130 Prince Street (Wooster), manuela-nyc.com.
La Tête d’Or
A come hither glow emanates from the double-height glass door of La Tête d’Or, the multi-Michelin-starred chef Daniel Boulud’s first steakhouse, which opened last November in a new office tower at One Madison Avenue. It’s named after the largest urban park in Boulud’s hometown, Lyon, France, and was designed by Rockwell Group. Which explains why this is a rare eatery where the design was just as jaw-dropping in the main dining room as it was in the bar.
It is opulence with a quietly cinematic quality, thanks to the designers’ use of warm colors, rich natural materials and excellent lighting. (Let us not forget that David Rockwell, the founder of Rockwell Group, is a multiple Tony Award nominee and won in 2016 for the best scenic design of a musical for “She Loves Me”).
The bar area boasts 18-foot ceilings but feels intimate thanks to a stepped-down ceiling, and walls clad in leather with wood trim. Similarly, the 120-person dining room feels more intimate than one would expect.
Curved banquettes are set under a partially coffered ceiling, multiple sources of light exude warmth, and what looks like a work of art in the kitchen is a hood created from a commissioned collage by the Belgian artist Jesse Willems and crafted from five different metals.
318 Park Ave. South (23rd), latetedorbydaniel.com.
Shirokuro
The restaurateur James Lim first encountered a 2D restaurant — where architectural and interior details are hand drawn, creating the illusion of an illustrated world — about 10 years ago in Korea. Last month he opened one in the East Village. It’s a Japanese restaurant called Shirokuro, which translates to “white-black” — the color scheme of the entire restaurant.
All of it was hand painted by Mirim Yoo, a friend of his. She was the real estate agent who helped him find this space, but she’s also a School of Visual Arts graduate. She noted in an emailed statement that “art has been a constant thread throughout my life.” She added that her artistic path “has always been interdisciplinary — spanning painting, ceramics, illustration, fashion and immersive environments.”
She spent almost three months painstakingly creating the environment in a style she said drew from Japanese Sumi-e ink painting, albeit reinterpreted through her decidedly modern lens.
103 Second Avenue (6th Street), shirokuroNYC.com.
Monsieur
Baz Luhrmann, the film director and producer, and his wife, Catherine Martin, a costume and set designer, teamed up on the interiors for Monsieur, a new bar in the East Village.
Located in the spot that once housed The Boiler Room, a gay bar that moved to a new location nearby, Monsieur features Martin’s Jungle Room wallpaper for Mokum, the Australian textile and wallpaper company, on the walls; her Beverly Hills fabric, also designed for Mokum, on some of the upholstery; and strategic used of stained glass, most notably behind the backlit bar.
Overall, it is dark with a medieval vibe: dark wood columns and beams, dark wood chairs, dark wood tables. The ceilings are low, as is the lighting, which includes Murano glass sconces and pendants, along with lamps with red shades and black tassels.
Visitors will also notice a plethora of — there’s no other way to describe them — random tchotchkes. Many apparently came from Luhrmann himself, as he told Vanity Fair. Some are displayed in cabinets, but many are scattered throughout the space — tempting souvenirs of a festive night.
86 East 4th Street (Second Avenue), monsieurnyc.com.
