The Nightlife Conference

Yes, you read that correctly. MAD Museum is hosting a weekend of talks centered on the social practice of NYC nightlife, Nov. 8-10.

Among the panels to choose from are:
-You Deserve a Drink Ticket! The Art of Hosting
-States of Excess and Undress: Fashion, Performance, and Taboo in Nightlife

But some actually have seem to have some meat to them, like:
-What Ever Happened to Flyers? Nightlife Post-Internet
Which will explore how the virtual social space of the Internet alters the physical architecture of nightlife venues, among other things.

Patricia Field kicks things off with the keynote speech—on Friday night, of course.

Marea: Nautical in the Best Way

In August, I wrote about The Butterfly. Which makes this my second writeup about an Altamarea Group NYC restaurant in a short while. I guess that's because my experiences there have been so enjoyable. Unlike The Butterfly, which is quite casual and in TriBeCa, Marea is more of a special-occasion destination in Midtown. Also different is that it's known for its seafood (marea is Spanish for "tide"), which I can confirm, after the Branzino I had, is delicious.

Branzino, pumpkin, coco beans, spigarello, marcona almonds

The seaside is also translated into the design, executed by Richard H. Lewis Architect and Franco Rosignolo, but in such an elegant and artistic way. Sure, there are seashells, but they're presented dramatically like individual sculptures—limestone bases and all—that they seem perfectly at home in the urban setting. I'd love to have the below one in my house, which, too, is not anywhere near a beach.

Then there's the actual art: a stunning collection of water-themed photography. Pieces appear throughout the dining room, of course, but some of my favorites were downstairs, in the restroom lounge, and even in the restroom stalls.

In the dining room

Restroom lounge

Restroom stall

A Rural Saturday

There are many treasures in the food and design worlds to be discovered just outside the city. An hour north by car, up the Palisades, lies Garrison and Cold Spring, two charming hamlets worthy of exploration.

The former is perhaps best-known for Manitoga/The Russel Wright Design Center, the mid 20th–century home and studio of the modern ceramicist that's situated above a former quarry amid 75 woodland acres. Standard tours are offered but so are volunteer landscape days, which is what we did and which I totally recommend—a really wonderful way to immerse yourself in the setting, help preserve a National Historic Landmark and World Monuments Watch Site, and meet like-minded people. . .plus they provide a lovely lunch.

Russel Wright's house

Dining area with Wright ceramicware

The wooden tub & view in Wright's studio

A 1959 letter from Edward J Wormley to Wright (notice the cigs)

Designer and fellow volunteer Anita Csordas exploring the 75-acre woodlands

A drive literally down the road takes you back a whole other century to Boscobel, an estate built in the early 1800's in the New York Federal style. We didn't tour the house, but we did walk the grounds, which include an orangery and stunning Hudson River views. 

The Boscobel orangery

Kousa dogwoods dot the estate grounds

Cold Spring is another short drive, and its Main Street is perfect for a window-shopping stroll, followed by a snack at one of the cafés. We were drawn most by the clapboard Cape-Cod style of Hudson Hil's, a clever moniker derived from the co-owner's name, Hilary Hayes, and the menu's offerings made of fresh, local ingredients from Hudson Valley farms. 

Homemade at Hudson Hil's with produce from local farms

Excessive Accessorizing?

First, the wine glass got accessorized with charms. Now it seems it's the cookie jar's turn. PlaceTile Designs introduces the ceramic Fits for the Occasion Cookie Chair, which has a socket for interchangeable, magnetically attached motif designs. Witness the below pineapple, turtle, and fleur-de-lis motifs. And there are many more...think holiday, safari, coastal. Apparently the options are endless. The oval below the motif is a writeable area that can be labeled with an erasable marker. Which could come in handy should you want to swap out the jar's contents from cookies to, say, pineapples, turtles, or fleur-de-lis. 

Dinner With Designer (DWD): Alder x Jennifer Carpenter

In the (not-so) gritty East Village, a sunny yellow door and shingle-style cladding beckon you into Alder, a new casual restaurant-pub by Wylie Dufresne, of wd~50 fame. Inside, the menu and the design wink strongly to the north, specifically to Cape Cod, where Dufresne spent his summers as a child. Of course this being NY, and Dufresne and executive chef Jon Bignelli being wunderkinds, classic American and New England fare has been creatively reinterpreted: Pigs in a blanket are filled with Chinese sausage; New England clam chowder comes with oyster crackers that are actual oysters, fried; fish & chips are generously heaped & tastefully presented on a slate slab.

Fish & Chips

Clam Chowder with Oyster Crackers

Pigs in a Blanket

The design, by Jennifer Carpenter Architect, is equally comfortable and familiar yet inventive. This was the first restaurant job for Carpenter, who incidentally is a sister of Dufresne's wife, Maile, although she's a seasoned architect with a successful portfolio of retail and residential projects. Her main move was the ceiling: a series of fins made of wood repurposed from a fence from, yes, Cape Cod. What could just be regular rustic appears minimalist and contemporary, thanks to each fin being strung on a blackened-steel rod, then canted at 1 of 12 different angles, creating a subtle rhythm. Wood appears elsewhere—the floor, the chairs, the banquette—yet ironically none of it is alder wood. Carpenter pays tribute to the wood at the entry door, its forged-bronze handle sporting indentations like an alder branch.

Entry with alder-like bronze handle

 Ceiling fins

 Menu

Goodbye. . .for now

A Twitter post by Bobby Flay and the NY Times Dining section today announced that Mesa Grill is closing on August 31. Flay's post indicated it will reopen in another location. Until then, remember the Flatiron location, which served customers for 22 years.

Photo by Evan Sung for The New York Times

Hennessy X Os Gêmeos

For it's third artist collaboration, cognac brand Hennessy has invited Os Gêmeos to design a limited-edition bottle label. The Brazilian identical-twin brothers, Otavio and Gustavo Pandolfo (os gemeos means "twins" in Portuguese), said their design, quite a departure from the graffiti-like art they're known for, is similar to a drawing each of the brothers did when they were around 6 years old. Today, the twins are busy in their São Paulo studio preparing for two big exhibitions: one in Brazil in 2014 and one in NYC in 2015.

Meanwhile, Hennessy, which began its artist collaboration in 2011 with Kaws and followed in 2012 with Futura, is finalizing which artist it will partner with for 2014. Every Limited Edition Hennessy V.S bottle in this artist series is individually numbered.

Here's a recipe from the twins for a cocktail called Brazil Spice: 

Brazil Spice

1.5 oz Hennessy V.S

.5 Fresh Lime juice

.5 Fresh Simple Syrup

Splash of soda

Optional: 4 dashes of Angostura bitters

Garnish: Lime wheel

Note: The lime and simple syrup can be substituted with 1 oz of sourmix.

Method: Shake all ingredients but the sprite and strain into a rocks glass with ice add a splash of sprite and garnish with lime wheel.

The Butterfly, NYC

Michael White's latest endeavor is a bit of a departure. Unlike his other Altamarea Group restaurants Marea, Ai Fiori, and Costata, a visit to The Butterfly in TriBeCa doesn't require a special occasion or an expense account. It does require, however, a taste for the vintage and the mid-century modern—both in design and somewhat in cuisine. For those wondering about the restaurant's name, it actually hails from Wisconsin (as does White): working at the Butterfly Club in Beloit was one of White's first cooking jobs. Although he was there in 1989, White's NYC reinterpretation has a mod 1960's feel, rendered by Stefano Angeli and Franco Rosignolo, his frequent design collaborators. You'll find George Nelson clocks, mid-century Scandinavian cupboards, a Sputnik pendant fixture—even the waitstaff wears plastic pen pocket protectors. The menu skews toward Americana nostalgia, too. There are versions of a reuben, a patty melt, and fried chicken on the menu; our dessert, called Little B, was like a fancy, and equally yummy, Ring Ding. The Midwest Butterfly offered entertainment with dinner; the urban version plans to host screenings of Packers football games and the Oscars on a huge flat-screen. 

Crab cakes

the upscale Ring-Ding: Little B

Bouley Test Kitchen, NYC

The buzzer to the test kitchen

The Bouley Test Kitchen, aka Bouley TK, in TriBeca is a grand loft space that offers cooking classes and that can be rented for events, like product previews, which is what I was there for (for DeLonghi and Kenwood).

Slate wall; the writing is the original menu from Bouley restaurant

There's a full state-of-the-art kitchen, obviously, but also a library of 8,000 cookbooks, a 200-foot-long slate wall, and a full bathroom suite with shower. There's also a funky metal fish sculpture.

Shower

Fish sculpture

Tons of hanging copper pots & pans

The library and handcrafted Nautilus speakers

Fort Greene in the Rain

I took a little field trip tonight to one of Brooklyn's finest, Fort Greene. Even in the rain, the broad leafy streets lined with brownstones are movie-set-worthy. We popped into a tiny gem of a restaurant that I hadn't heard of, Lulu & Po, and proceeded to have a delicious meal of small but shareable plates: chicken liver & pancetta paté with hearty grilled bread, seared Alaskan salmon with corn and lemon cream, sugar snap peas with house made cultured butter (heavenly), and grilled pizza dough with a side of whipped ricotta and pesto. We sat at the bar, which was cozy and where we were well taken care of. Designwise, the setting is noteworthy, too. Concrete and metal surfaces are warmed up by a wood (I think pine) ceiling and the occasional red bar stool or dining chair. One wall is entirely blank save for an oversize, off-center rooster--it looks like a tattoo (this is Brooklyn, after all). You can leave your own temporary tattoo in the restroom: a chalkboard wall begs to be scribbled on with the chunky sticks of chalk provided in a metal pail. Ligaya Mishan wrote in her New York Times review of Lulu & Po, "No one does industrial-cozy chic like Brooklyn," and she's right, at least with this space (her piece has good pics, too). The one drawback is that it's almost unpleasantly loud--bad acoustics coupled with loud music. If the music could just be turned down a notch, it would make all the difference.

Star Table at Blue Note

Le Petit Prince

The restaurant space at 199 Prince has hosted many a tenant in recent years. (Long ago, for a long while, it was the charming Frontiére.) Goblin Market (ok, not great), Shorty's (good food, bad vibe), Princepessa (bad name, bad vibe). But its current incarnation, Little Prince, has promise. A bit loud & hot, but a very pretty space, helpful & friendly staff & exceptional food. Bon chance petite prince! 

Wine list

Vintage phone w flower stems given to female customers

Stanford White Studio

Chatwal hotel lobby mural by unknown artist

I had a lovely dinner last night at the Stanford White Studio inside the Chatwal hotel-also home to the Lambs Club. Weirdly, I hadn't been here before, even though the super-talented Thierry Despont did the interiors two years ago. I recommend a visit if you're at all into Art Deco--and even if you're not. The lobby (where there's an amazing double-height mural but I don't know by who), restaurant, upstairs bar (where Andrew Andrew DJ every Thurs night), and White studio are quite well done. The White studio is the hotel's special-event space - a gorgeous wood-paneled room done in the style of Stanford White (who built the building that now houses the hotel in 1905 for the Lambs Club, a social club for theater professionals) - that's a unique option for a private dinner for 20 or so. So long as you don't get creeped out by the Evelyn Nesbit portraits on the wall--and the red swing that's rumored to be installed soon... I also recommend coming for chef Geoffrey Zakarian's cuisine--unusual and flavorful.

McKim, Mead & White rendering in the Stanford White Studio

Portraits of Evelyn Nesbit

Slow-cooked sea bass with caramelized fennel, spinach & roasted tomato beurre blanc

The lobby bar

Empire State Building pendants in the upstairs bar