KAMALIWIRE

Soho House

Le Bain

Wythe Hotel

PhD

Gansevoort Park

Catch

230 Fifth

The DL

ink48

Here’s a peak inside the “all-day American brasserie” that the operators of Tocqueville and 15 East are opening on the ground floor of the long delayed Hyatt Union Square.

Named after Paris’s Fourth Arrondissement (and located on Fourth Avenue), The Fourth will occupy one of the city’s legendary nightlife spaces: 76 East 13th Street has held The Cat Club, The Grand, Spa, and Plaid. According to the Hyatt’s Website, the 100-seat room will boast “a café with a European style espresso and wine bar, a 24-seat communal bar and dining space, and a 45-seat full-service formal dining area.”

The menu will consist of “traditional brasserie fare with a modern American interpretation: upscale fare with a continental flair.” The wine program will be overseen by Roger Dagorn, the highly decorated Master Sommelier from Chanterelle, Tocqueville and 15 East, and the cafe will have its own private-label coffee.

The hotel will also open with a cocktail spot, Singl Lounge.

A glimpse through the construction paper shows the place is putting its 30-foot ceilings to use, via some sort of wacky installation (are those bed frames?) suspended above the bar.

According to its Website, the hotel will open April 31.

Source: {The Local East Village}

New York, NY – February 4, 2013 

Midtown Manhattan’s Garment District will be welcoming a new-build, luxury hotel next year on West 38^th Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues.  The ARCHER^sm Hotel, a 21-story property that will be home to 180 guestrooms, a chef-driven restaurant and a rooftop bar, is being thoughtfully designed with industrial touches of the neighborhood’s heritage, from exposed brick and steel to butcher-block flooring.  Upon entering the lobby, eclectic elegance comes into play with a custom-designed and curated furniture collection, coupled with an art consultant’s hand-picked pieces for this boutique hotel.  

Bringing ARCHER to life is owner and developer LodgeWorks, Partners L.P., a privately-held hotel development and management company with a rich history in noteworthy openings, with architectural direction and design under the detail-oriented eyes of Glen Coben of Glen and Company, based in Manhattan.  “ARCHER is not just a hotel; it’s a personality, an eclectic way of being, a welcoming residence, if you will,” said Cheryl Gilliam, VP brands & marketing for LodgeWorks.  “Guests are meant to feel as if they are entering a home in many ways, yet it is unlike any other.  It’s a warm, welcoming place that is dotted with Chesterfield-style sofas, vibrant art, exposed brick and elegant wood-paneled millwork.  It’s a place that might have been here before, timeless in some ways, yet of today in many more; it’s a new American classic.” 

One of the most telling details of the residential-minded design is the quartet of design palettes for the guestrooms.  “In a home you would not create each and every bedroom to be identical,” said Coben.  “The same thought process held true as we developed ARCHER’s guestrooms; there’s a certain charm and beauty in the randomness of your stay,” he explained.  There is an element of guestroom roulette, as travelers will not know which of the four room types they will get.  This is thought to be an unprecedented design move in a property this size.  Custom drapery, the headboard, ottoman, throw pillow and blanket will vary within the four designs.  The ARCHER rooms, 22 in total, will have additional distinctions with wood floors and an exposed brick wall at the head of the bed.  ARCHER will have one signature suite that is in its final design phase at the moment. 

In the coming months the culinary program of the restaurant and rooftop bar, with panoramic views of the city, will be unveiled.  The components of which were carefully curated and guided by STEVEN KAMALI HOSPITALITY.  The restaurant will soon have a face and a name of an A-list Celebrity Chef who is widely known and respected!

ARCHER’s other amenities and services will include an on-site fitness room, storied-retail selections from local artisans available to take home, a concierge, complimentary iMac use with printing available, nightly turndown service, complimentary newspapers and 100% smoke-free environment. 

In March of this year model rooms will be completed and final design details revealed.  For more information, and updates as ARCHER evolves, visit www.archerhotel.com.

 LODGEWORKS

LodgeWorks, L.P., is a privately held hotel development and management company with a rich history as hospitality brand innovators, industry-leading guest satisfaction, sophisticated development acumen and an experienced team that has successfully collaborated for more than 28 years. Among recent developments, the company has sold a portfolio of assets to Hyatt Hotels Corporation. LodgeWorks continues to own, franchise and/or manage a portfolio of branded hotels including Hotel Sierra®, HYATT house®, Hyatt Place®, Aloft®, Hawthorn Suites®, and Hilton Garden Inn®.  The company is developing two new hotels in New York; ARCHER, an independent boutique hotel in Manhattan and a Hampton Inn® in Brooklyn. For more information, please visit www.lodgeworks.com.

Next month, The Halkin by COMO in London will open a new restaurant from the team behind Spain’s Arzak, which holds three Michelin stars.

Ametsa with Arzak Instruction will serve new Basque cuisine featuring fresh, locally sourced and organic ingredients. Elena Arzak, Juan Mari Arzak, Mikel Sorazu, Igor Zalakain and Xabier Gutierrez will run Ametsa, which translates to “dream.”

(left to right): Xabier Gutierrez, Mikel Sorazu, Elena Arzak, Igor Zalakain and Juan Mari Arzak

AB Rogers is designing the interiors to blend Basque heritage with contemporary design.

Ametsa will replace nahm, the Thai restaurant that’s been at The Halkin since 2000. Nahm Chef David Thompson will continue to cook at the second nahm location, with Metropolitan by COMO, Bangkok.

This lobster dish is indicative of what diners may be served at Ametsa.

(Source: HotelsMag.com)

United States
The Quin Hotel, New York
New York City’s historic 57th Street Buckingham Hotel—built in 1929 and frequented by musical legends like pianist/composer Ignacy Jan Paderewski and Metropolitan Opera greats Giuseppe De Luca and Giovanni Martinelli—will be restored as The Quin Hotel. The 18-story gem is to open February 2013 and aims to capitalize on its artistic heritage and its location, which is within walking distance of cultural hotspots like Carnegie Hall, the Museum of Modern Art and the 57th Street gallery district. The hotel will have 200 rooms, an art gallery featuring works by Irish painter Patrick Graham, an American eatery, a spa partner and a business center.

Capella Washington D.C., Georgetown
Washington, D.C. visitors will soon be able to check in to this new luxury Georgetown hotel opening February 2013. Located on the C&O Canal and near Rock Creek Park, Georgetown University and the Kennedy Center, the hotel will have 49 guest rooms and 12 suites, each with a dedicated personal assistant available 24/7 to take care of tasks such as airport transportation and setting up private museum tours. Other highlights: a rooftop infinity pool and the tastefully decorated Capella Living Room—also staffed with a personal assistant—where you can relax near the two-story onyx fireplace and have a refreshment or two.

Salamander Resort & Spa, Middleburg, Va.
Set on 340 acres in the picturesque countryside of Virginia’s Loudoun County (just an hour from Washington, D.C.), the Salamander Resort & Spa is slated to open in August 2013. The sprawling resort will include an equestrian center and 22-stall stable (for those who want to bring along their horses), a 23,000-square-foot spa with “treehouse” treatment rooms overlooking the woods and nearby stream, and indoor and outdoor event spaces, including a 100-year-old restored barn. An equestrian-themed restaurant with wine bar and terrace boasting views of Virginia’s wine country will serve Virginia Piedmont-influenced cuisine.

The Langham, Chicago

Chicago’s riverfront Mies van der Rohe building—the last high-rise designed by the late architect—will soon house a glamorous hotel. The Langham, Chicago, set to open in summer 2013, will include 320 luxe guest rooms, a 9,000-square-foot spa and 20,000 square feet of meeting space. The 52-story River North structure, which was put on the National Register for Historic Places in 2010, will include a Palm Court restaurant with afternoon tea service and access to the river jetty for hotel guests who’d like go for a quick cruise.

El Encanto, Santa Barbara, Calif.
This peaceful escape (now part of the Orient-Express Hotels portfolio) is set among the hills overlooking the Pacific and will be restored to its original elegance by its scheduled opening in March 2013. Many of El Encanto’s 92 California-style bungalows will include in-room fireplaces and private terraces with views of the resort’s seven acres of gardens, Santa Barbara and the Pacific Ocean. A personal concierge will connect guests with special requests—perhaps a candlelit dinner for two? The hotel’s close proximity to Northern California’s wineries and art galleries will likely make it an ideal location to spend a long weekend.

Latin America
Waldorf Astoria Panama
Waldorf Astoria’s first Latin American resort, Waldorf Astoria Panama, will open in March 2013. The 130-room hotel sits in the trendy Calle Uruguay neighborhood, just 15 minutes from Marcos A. Gelabert International Airport and within walking distance of the sprawling La Cinta Costera park. Hotel highlights include a 2,500-square-foot spa, outdoor pool, 1,200-square-foot fitness center and four hotspots to grab a bite or a tropical cocktail: a sushi bar, an American- and French-cuisine brasserie, a lobby bar, and a terrace and pool bar.

Four Seasons Hotel Lion Palace St. Petersburg
Expected to open in spring 2013, Four Seasons Hotel Lion Palace St. Petersburg is a restored palace once home to a Russian princess. The hotel’s grand marble staircase is accented with gold and bronze molding, painstakingly returned to its 1820s glory using the original architectural drawings as a reference. One of the palace’s former courtyards is now the glassed-in Tea Lounge, which will serve breakfast, tea and light dinner. Guests will also be able to dine on Italian cuisine at Percorso, Asian cuisine at Sintoho, or have a glass of cognac at Xander bar. A four-level luxury spa with an enclosed rooftop pool and several treatment rooms is also in the works.

The London Edition
The 177-year-old Berners Hotel in London’s Fitzrovia district will soon be transformed into a swanky Edition Hotel, the boutique brand owned by Marriott International and headed up by hotelier extraordinaire Ian Schrager. The company is keeping details about the new London hotel confidential, but if it’s anything like The Istanbul Edition, which opened in 2011, it will include stylish, high-tech rooms, a luxe spa and top-notch dining. The luxury lifestyle brand is set to have six hotels by 2015—Miami is up next, and is slated to open fourth quarter 2013.

Shangri-La Hotel, at The Shard, London
Only a hotel in a towering glass spire could offer views like these. The Shard (designed by renowned architect Renzo Piano and now the tallest building in Western Europe) is soon to be home to Shangri-La Hotel, at The Shard, London, which will boast 185 deluxe guest rooms and 17 suites with incredible views of the city. Guest rooms will include signature beds that use patented body-contouring technology, LCD TVs and hi-fi equipment. The hotel’s café will feature numerous cooking stations serving cuisine from around the world. And let’s not forget the indoor infinity pool and fitness center with unrivaled panoramic views of the London skyline.

The Peninsula Paris
The Hong Kong-based Peninsula Hotels group makes its European debut with The Peninsula Paris in late 2013. Rather than erecting a new building, the Paris hotel will occupy a century-old structure—a Beaux-Arts gem constructed in 1908 that once housed the Majestic Hotel. The luxe hotel group is taking great measures to ensure the building is restored to its original grandeur and that it blends seamlessly with the existing Parisian architecture in the posh 16th arrondissement. Once complete, it will house 200 guest rooms and a spa on the enviable Avenue Kléber near the iconic Champs-Élysées.

Shangri-La Bosphorus, Istanbul
Shangri-La Bosphorus, Istanbul will be the luxury hotel brand’s first in Turkey when in opens in the first quarter of 2013. The hotel sits on the shore of the Bosphorus Strait in the Besiktas district near the Dolmabahce Palace, and will be the second tallest building on the coastline when completed. Shangri-La Bosphorus, Istanbul’s186 guest rooms—which include 17 suites with sea views—will have a contemporary design scheme with Asian touches. Both Western and Asian cuisine will be offered at the hotel restaurant, and afternoon tea and tapas will be served in the Lobby Lounge, which includes a tea lounge, bar and outdoor terrace. CHI, The Spa at Shangri-La will specialize in Chinese healing therapies and will have two hammams.

Asia
Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai
The sleek Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai opens in March 2013, and sits on the banks of Shanghai’s Huangpu River among the financial district’s towering skyscrapers. Throughout the sleek high-rise, you’ll find the warm hues and modern furnishings for which the luxury hotel group is known. The hotel will include 318 spacious guest rooms and 44 suites, including one duplex suite and an 8,481-square-foot presidential suite, as well as 210 apartment units—serviced by the hotel—with panoramic views of the river. Mandarin Oriental Pudong, Shanghai will also have six different dining venues (one serving fine Chinese cuisine), an indoor pool with plush loungers and a 13-treatment room spa.

The PuSen Forest Retreat and Spa, Shaoxing, China
One of the more unique getaways to debut in 2013, The PuSen Forest Retreat and Spa will be made up of 50 meticulously restored Zhejiang Province homes, all between 200 and 400 years old. These gorgeous Chinese villas, decorated with elaborate carvings, are tucked into the lush mountain forests of Shaoxing prefecture. When the remote retreat opens in the second quarter of 2013, guests can book villas (some with private pools), dine at two on-site restaurants and get treatments at the relaxing spa.

Regent Bali
Regent Bali is an exotic retreat in the Sanur district and is set to open in June 2013. The resort promises to be a serene tropical escape with 10 acres of lush Balinese-style gardens and 656 feet of golden sandy beach. It has one sprawling beachfront villa with a private pool, a hot tub, and its own spa treatment room (with a steam room no less). But most guests will find themselves in one of the hotel’s 94 suites, which aren’t too shabby either—each has butler service, traditional Balinese décor and gorgeous views of either the gardens or the island of Nusa Lembongan and the Indian Ocean.

Rosewood Beijing
The 279-room Rosewood Beijing, opening summer 2013 in the Chaoyang business district, will have unusually large rooms—the average size is 538 square feet—rivaling a luxury Beijing apartment, with walk-in closets, spacious bathrooms, window seats, muted Asian-style décor and natural finishes. Would-be guests can expect a spa (with five overnight spa suites), yoga studio, indoor pool and gym; nearly 33,000 square feet of space for meetings and events (including an 8,249-square-foot ballroom with an outdoor garden); and seven restaurants and bars featuring international cuisine.

Cheval Blanc Randheli, Maldives
Sprawled out on a remote island in Maldives’ Noonu Atoll, Cheval Blanc Randheli (part of LVMH’s luxe hotel portfolio) will be nothing short of extravagant when it opens next summer. The 45 airy loft-style villas—some set on the white-sand beach, others on stilts over turquoise waters—feature private infinity pools, impeccably appointed interiors and jaw-dropping views of the surrounding lagoon. Guests will be able to unwind in the Cheval Blanc Spa and take advantage of the island locale with a fleet of traditional dhoni boats (Maldivian fishing boats) specially crafted for Cheval Blanc. The idyllic retreat will also include four restaurants, ranging from fine dining to a fish market, as well as cigar and wine cellars.

Africa and the Middle East

The St. Regis Abu Dhabi
The St. Regis Abu Dhabi will have 283 luxe rooms, including 55 over-the-top suites when it opens in February 2013. It will occupy 16 floors (starting at the 33rd) in one of the two swanky Nation Towers high-rises on the Abu Dhabi Corniche. The sleek, modern towers are linked by a 656-foot-high sky bridge that will house the hotel’s most lavish guest suite: the three-bedroom, 11,679-square-foot Abu Dhabi Suite, which will not only have unparalleled 360-degree views of the Arabian Gulf and the city’s skyline, but its own movie theater, gym and private spa, too. The suite comes with 24-karat gold leaf and shimmering crystal accents, leather-tiled and velvet-upholstered walls, and a grand staircase that leads to the master bedroom. Guests will be able to choose from more than 10 eateries and bars, including Rhodes 44, named for its famed chef Gary Rhodes.

The Ritz-Carlton Abu Dhabi, Grand Canal
Already accepting reservations for March 2013, The Ritz-Carlton Abu Dhabi, Grand Canal will debut with a private beach, a palatial 17,222-square-foot outdoor pool, European-inspired gardens and Renaissance architecture reminiscent of 15th- to 17th-century Venice. Guests can check in to one of the hotel’s 87 one- and two-bedroom villas—each with an outdoor terrace overlooking the Grand Mosque (the largest in the UAE)—or opt for one of its 447 resort-style suites and guest rooms. The 21,500-square-foot spa will appeal to both men and women, with a hammam, steam room, salon, fitness center, outdoor plunge pools and 15 treatment rooms.

Mahali Mzuri, Kenya
In 2013, Sir Richard Branson’s exclusive Virgin Limited Edition collection of retreats welcomes a new member: Mahali Mzuri, a minimal-footprint safari camp in Kenya’s Motorogi Conversancy just north of the Maasai Mara National Reserve. The eco-friendly retreat will include 12 luxury canvas tents perched on platforms, each with a bedroom, sitting room, in-suite bathroom and, most importantly, a terrace with sweeping views of the landscape and its intriguing wildlife—think lions, giraffes and wildebeests. The lavish camp will offer daily game drives and guided walks in the Motorogi and Olare Orok Conservancies, plus the opportunity to tour the local village to learn more about the Maasai people.

The Ritz-Carlton, Herzliya, Israel
The Ritz-Carlton is making its Israeli debut in 2013 with The Ritz-Carlton, Herzliya, a coastal resort overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. The seaside getaway (the first ever kosher Ritz-Carlton, complete with a synagogue, kosher kitchens and Shabbat elevators) is centrally located—just 15 minutes from Tel Aviv and an hour from Jerusalem. Decorated in calming shades of gold and blue, the 197 luxury guest rooms—including 82 studio, one- and two-bedroom suites—will have views of the sea. Guests will be able to relax in the Eastern Mediterranean sun at the rooftop pool or by lounging on the beach.

(Source: Forbes)

SOURCE: ESquared Hospitality

The Alex Hotel Selects Leading Restaurant Group to Take Over Food and Beverage Services

NEW YORK, NY—(Marketwire - Nov 28, 2012) - ESquared Hospitality announced today that the international restaurant and hospitality group has been selected to take over the food and beverage services at The Alex Hotel, located in the heart of Manhattan’s midtown east at 205 East 45^th Street, New York, NY 10017. Effective immediately, ESquared Hospitality is managing the hotel’s room service, catering and banquet services, and has unveiled a new restaurant, Atrium, in the space formerly known as Riingo. Led by Chef Dennis Franke, Atrium features an all-day menu of American classics and ESquared Hospitality’s signature dishes in an intimate 50-seat setting.

“We have an opportunity to invigorate and elevate The Alex Hotel’s food and beverage offerings by incorporating the extraordinary food and excellent customer service that are synonymous with ESquared Hospitality,” said Jimmy Haber, managing partner of ESquared Hospitality. “The addition of Atrium and The Alex Hotel to our restaurant and hospitality portfolio marks the beginning of what will be a year of significant growth for our business.”

“With a proven expertise in exceeding guest expectations throughout its collection of hotel partnerships and signature restaurants, ESquared Hospitality was a natural fit for The Alex Hotel,” said Beth Tufekcic, general manager at The Alex Hotel. “The team has already implemented a number of positive changes and we are excited to see what the future holds.”

ESquared Hospitality has aligned with high-profile hotels across the nation, including notable brands such as The Ritz-Carlton by Marriott, W Hotels by Starwood Hotels & Resorts, and the Trump Hotel Collection.

For additional information, please visit: http://www.e2hospitality.com/. For media inquiries, please contact 5W Public Relations.

ABOUT ESQUARED HOSPITALITY
ESquared Hospitality is an international restaurant and hospitality group owned by Jimmy Haber and Keith Treyball. ESquared Hospitality is currently comprised of three divisions, one of which is BLT Restaurants. Restaurants within the BLT Restaurant Group division include BLT Steak in New York, NY (2004), Washington, DC (2006), San Juan, PR (2006), White Plains, NY (2007), Los Angeles, CA (2008), Scottsdale, AZ (2008), Atlanta, GA (2009), Miami, FL (2009), Hong Kong (2009), Charlotte, NC (2009) and Waikiki, HI (2009); BLT Burger in New York, NY (2006), Las Vegas, NV (2008) and Hong Kong (2009); and BLT Fish and Fish Shack (2005), BLT Prime (2005) and BLT Bar & Grill (2010) in New York, NY. The second division of ESquared Hospitality includes two Italian concepts: Casa Nonna in New York, NY (2011) and The Florentine at the JW Marriott in Chicago, IL (2010). ESquared Hospitality’s third division is comprised of GO Burger restaurants which include the GO Burger Truck in New York, NY (2010) as well as four storefront GO Burger locations, one in Los Angeles, CA (2011) and three in New York, NY (2012).

ABOUT THE ALEX HOTEL, NYC
When The Alex opened its doors in March 2004, it set the bar for a new generation of luxurious and comfortable accommodation. The stylish, 33-story tower, designed by acclaimed architect Costas Kondylis & Associates, rises above midtown within steps of prime business, shopping and entertainment areas. Its 203 guestroom and suites are a veritable feast of innovation thanks to legendary designer David Rockwell. They are outfitted with custom multi-functional furnishings and original artwork. Adding to its distinctions are a wealth of personalized services, as well as Atrium, a restaurant by international restaurant and hospitality group ESquared Hospitality.

Meet the chic and cheeky Balazs, whose Standard hotels have turned high-end hospitality upside down

Talk about making an entrance. When the Standard hotel opened back in 2009, all anyone could talk about were the exhibitionists getting freaky in the windows of the 18-story, glass-fronted hotel that had just risen (ha) above the High Line park in Chelsea. This wasn’t the first time André Balazs, the man behind the Standard, had flaunted sex to create buzz. The West Hollywood outpost of the hotel opened in 2002 and featured a model in a bikini lounging in a fish tank behind the front desk. At the nearby Chateau Marmont, meanwhile, Balazs made headlines by stocking condoms in the hotel minibars. Part of the appeal of an André Balazs hotel, it seemed, was the feeling that somewhere in the building someone was getting it on.

In recent years, a series of upstart properties—the Ace Hotel chain in New York and Las Vegas, the Palihouse in Los Angeles—began encroaching on the Standard’s cool, debuting buzzy restaurants, luxurious gift shops and lobbies populated by beautiful laptop warriors. Mention these new competitors to Balazs and he’s quick to point out that “they all used to work for me or work with us.” But he certainly appears ready for  a counterattack.  

Perhaps borrowing from the world of fashion, where creative collaborations are all the rage, Balazs, 55, has aligned with a series of hip names to ensure there’s more to the Standard than, you know, waking the neighbors. Seamus Mullen, who redefined tapas at Tertulia in the West Village, was recently the chef-in-residence at the Standard Plaza in New York’s Meatpacking District, where a newly installed woodburning oven is as inviting as a campfire. 

Balazs quietly acquired the Cooper Square Hotel on Manhattan’s east side in October 2011 and rebranded it the Standard, East Village. A spring 2013 relaunch is expected (look for a new entrance, among other improvements). He enlisted the eyeglass purveyors from Warby Parker to curate a hip Readery. 

Most impressively, this fall Susan Sarandon installs the first permanent L.A. branch of her Ping-Pong club, SPiN, at the Standard, Downtown L.A. The Oscar-winning actress had been looking to expand to L.A. ever since the New York branch first opened in the Flatiron District—but couldn’t find the right location. The Standard, Downtown L.A. not only fit the brand but also was accessible and offered an easy liquor license. “The only thing you can count on is that Ping-Pong and drinking go well together,” Sarandon says with a laugh, adding, “The Standard is witty. They know how to have fun. And André is the right combination of business and hip.” The cumulative effect of these big changes at the Standard, it seems, is to create a clubhouse feel. “You can call it a clubhouse,” Balazs says. “But I like to think of it as a culture. You keep layering things on. Otherwise you’re just a Sheraton. You’re just a bunch of rooms.” As for the table tennis, he smiles and says, “It’s the thinking man’s bowling.”

If Balazs disdains the ordinary, he comes by that sentiment naturally. The son of Hungarian immigrants, he flirted with a career in journalism before starting a New Jersey-based biotech company with his father and then moving to SoHo when he was 27. At the time, the neighborhood was an industrial wasteland, and Balazs moved into a fifth-floor walk-up on Greene Street. “Most of the time,” he says, “you’d throw your keys down to your friends in a pair of athletic socks. And they’d trudge up.” He palled around with Calvin Klein and Keith McNally; when Eric Goode, the founder of the seminal nightclub M.K., asked if he wanted to invest in the club, Balazs found his calling.

If the hotelier Ian Schrager is known for spectacle, Balazs was becoming a pioneer of a different kind, forging headfirst into industrial neighborhoods with no foot traffic and creating spaces worth walking to. After revitalizing the Chateau Marmont in 1990, he bought an old warehouse in SoHo; eight years later it opened as the Mercer hotel—a celebrity-magnet from the get-go, not to mention a stylish hangout, what with its white tile, soft lighting and industrial fixtures. (Rupert and Wendi Murdoch lived there for months during their courtship; Wendi liked the décor so much that she hired the Mercer’s interior designer, Christian Liaigre, to do their SoHo apartment.) The Mercer was the first boutique hotel to open in SoHo. In 2002, Balazs would pull off the same trick in downtown Los Angeles with the Standard, Downtown L.A. 

“To call Downtown Los Angeles dead doesn’t begin to tell you what was going on there at the time,” Balazs says.  

Like Ralph Lauren or Martha Stewart, Balazs is the embodiment of his brand and its best spokesperson. He dated Uma Thurman in the days after her split with Ethan Hawke, and in a rare impulsive moment during a weekend getaway upstate, he bought Bob Guccione’s 19th-century Hudson Valley estate out of foreclosure. Though he and Thurman later split, his love of his upstate farm only grew. Now he’s raising cows, pigs and rabbits there and even supplies the Standard Grill with farm-to-table organic eats. “The chickens are particularly delicious,” Balazs points out. “We call them model birds—because they have very long legs.” Naturally.

In a way, Balazs has become his own worst enemy, constantly one-upping himself only to see rivals bite his style within moments. And there have been hurdles along the way, to be sure; his Jean-Nouvel-designed property on Mercer was planned as a hotel but went condo during the recession as banks suddenly saw tourism as a bad investment. (Meg Ryan, Daniel Radcliffe and Marc Jacobs were early residents at 40 Mercer, a building the architecture critic Herbert Muschamp described as being all “about sex.”) When the historic Hotel Chelsea went up for sale in 2011, Balazs was in the mix—and seemed a natural fit for the property. Its rock-and-roll roots dovetailed nicely with the Chateau Marmont’s own celebrated history. Some say Balazs lost out on the deal in a fierce bidding war, a claim he denies, saying, “Honestly, I didn’t want to be the asshole who evicted everybody.”

Expanding the Standard—as both a hotel and a lifestyle brand—seems to be his focus, with a London property likely. “We’d like to be overseas,” he says. As for the competitors nipping at his designer heels, Balazs exhales, exhibiting a Zen approach befitting a gentleman farmer: “Ian Schrager used to say there’s only one game in town. But I don’t subscribe to that mentality. It’s an egocentric perception of competition.” Since when was business about ego? 

The Properties of André Balazs: A Quick List 

The Mercer, New York
Housed in a six-story, 84,000-square-foot Romanesque revival building built in 1890 for John Jacob Astor II, the Mercer was Balazs’ first New York City property, opening in 1998. Decorated with minimalist Christian Liaigre furnishings, the hotel has 75 rooms and suites, some with fireplaces. Its most popular amenity? The spacious, lower-level, Jean-Georges Vongerichten restaurant, Mercer Kitchen. 

Chateau Marmont, Hollywood
This 63-room, 9-cottage, 4-bungalow hotel, Balazs’ first, was built in 1929 and modeled after the Château Royal d’Amboise in the Loire Valley. And while it was originally an apartment house, these days the celebrity haunt, which Balazs bought in 1990, is practically a Hollywood star itself. The restaurant remains one of L.A.’s best spots to see famous faces. 

Sunset Beach, Shelter Island
A ferry ride away from the teeming Hamptons, Shelter Island offers a laid-back alternative for the summering set—and Balazs’ Sunset Beach, which opened in 1997, fits right in. The 20-suite, seasonally operated hotel boasts outdoor showers, bicycles for guests and beachside dining, all of which add to its subdued, sandy appeal. 

The Standard, Hollywood, West Hollywood
Balazs opened the first of his Standard hotels, this Sunset Strip property, just steps from West Hollywood’s shopping, dining and nightlife, in 1999. Thanks to its sceney lobby, featuring live DJs nightly, and in-room hipster touches like Warhol-print drapes, the hotel has since lived up to its name as the definitive contemporary boutique hotel.  

The Standard, Downtown L.A.
Located in Los Angeles’ emerging Downtown neighborhood, Balazs’ second Standard hotel made its name hosting weekend parties at its rooftop pool and offering upscale lodging to suits descending upon nearby business centers. With a 24-hour restaurant, poolside bar and over 16,000 square feet of meeting and event space, it accommodates whatever guests might be looking for. 

The Standard Spa, Miami Beach
If its Belle Isle location wasn’t aquatic enough, the 105-room Standard Spa offers a variety of water-based treatments, including a Finnish sauna, Roman waterfall and Turkish-style bath. The healing theme continues with nutritional counseling, acupuncture and waterfront yoga. 

The Standard, High Line, New York
An 18-floor, 338-room pleasure palace with two tabloid-mainstay nightclubs, Balazs’ Meatpacking District hotel, which straddles Manhattan’s High Line park, was immediately infamous upon opening for its views from the promenade into often erotically occupied rooms. The hotel has proved so successful that in 2011, Balazs acquired an East Village building to expand his presence with a second Gotham Standard. —Adam Rathe

(Source: DuJour)

The restaurateur behind some of New York City’s most beloved restaurants shares his recipe for being the host (or hostess) with the most this holiday season

When it comes to extending a warm welcome, Danny Meyer famously has the golden touch. Through his Union Square Hospitality Group, the New York restaurateur runs some of the city’s most beloved restaurants—including Union Square Cafe, the Modern at the Museum of Modern Art, Gramercy Tavern, and Blue Smoke. Even Shake Shack, his burger chain—with outposts from Miami to Kuwait City—is a class act for both the quality of its food and the warmth and professionalism of its well-trained staff. Here, Meyer (who is also the author of Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business) shares his recipe for being the host (or hostess) with the most this holiday season.

Setting the Stage

• If you want to throw a great party, know that nothing rises to a higher level than how the hosts or host family treat one another. If you are arguing or tense, there is no way your guests won’t feel that. Don’t expect your guests to have a better time than you are having yourself.

• Get yourself in the frame of mind to have a good time at your own party. One thing that works for me is to get some exercise. It makes me feel better about myself and builds my appetite. When a host abstains from eating or drinking during a party, it sends a message that guests should hold back too.

The ingredients that go into being a good host line up beautifully with the five senses:

• Smell: I think people lead with their nose. There is no better compliment to a host than when a guest says, “It smells great in here.”

• Sight: Some hosts use a party as an excuse to clean their home, or hang that piece of art they’ve been meaning to hang. Go with that.

• Taste: Be generous. People shouldn’t be on portion control with food or beverages.

• Hearing: I have fun assembling a playlist. It’s rare when everyone likes the same music, so I shuffle: British rock and roll, Mozart, Oscar Peterson.

• Touch: Be aware of textural elements throughout a party, like silverware, stemware, and linens. But the biggest element is metaphorical: it’s your own touch. How are you making people feel?

• I love wine. These are my recommendations for holiday wines: For sparkling, Prosecco for every day and your favorite Champagne for celebrations. For white, Sauvignon Blanc from anywhere in the world or every day, because it’s affordable and everybody seems to like it. (I prefer Riesling but not everybody does.) For special occasions, white Burgundy. For red, Barbera from Piedmont, Italy, is my favorite wine to share, while Barolo is what I’d choose for a splurge.

• There are thousands of restaurants in New York City. If we don’t get it right, our survival is at stake.

• A restaurant is like an ant colony—everyone’s got a different job to do, but they depend on one another to do it. I watch how our staff treat one another even more than how they treat our guests. We have a book coming out this spring about our staff meals. We use that daily ritual to prepare ourselves emotionally to be a hospitality team.

• I don’t follow food trends. There is nothing new about Rome, but I opened a trattoria, Maialino, serving Roman cuisine. Cheeseburgers are not new, but we are doing them our way at Shake Shack. We focus on food that we love—and where we feel we have something fresh to add.

• People today are multitaskers; what that means in food is that they want more tastes per minute. We are doing more hors d’oeuvres, in smaller por- tions, so it’s easy to say yes. Don’t make the hors d’oeuvres too big; they’re awkward to hold when you are standing and talking.

• Everyone talks a big game about healthy food, but they also want a taste of hedonism. In 1984, the tennis player Arthur Ashe, who was suffering from a heart condition, came into a restaurant where I was working and listed all his food restrictions. We gave him a very healthy lunch. For dessert, he ordered a triple-layer chocolate cake. My jaw dropped, but now I realize it’s common. If you hold back on fat in the main course, follow up with a rich dessert.

(Source: Elle Decor)

Cantor Fitzgerald
Equity Research

November 21, 2012

Robert LaFleur
212-915-1259 
rlafleur@cantor.com

Gaming and Lodging

Cantor Fitzgerald’s Weekly Lodging Update - November 21, 2012

Cantor Fitzgerald’s Weekly Lodging Update is a one-stop resource for the most current lodging industry metrics from Smith Travel Research as well as our current lodging universe valuation comps, recent stock price performance, and short interest analysis.

Results From the Week Ending 11/17/12

- U.S. RevPAR up 11.3% to $67.32

- U.S. ADR up 6.4% to $108.63

- U.S. Occupancy up 280 bps to 62.0%

- Upper Upscale RevPAR up 11.4% to $126.38

- Upper Upscale ADR up 6.8% to $162.31

- Upper Upscale Occupancy up 330 bps to 77.9%

Best Performing City: Phila. with RevPAR up 26.3%

Worst Performing City: Orlando with RevPAR down 2.9%

Top 5 Market Weekly RevPAR Trends:

- Boston up 22.3%

- Chicago up 4.6%

- NYC up 19.1%

- SF up 23.9%

- DC down 0.9%

 QTD Highlights Through 11/17/12

- U.S. RevPAR up 5.9% to $69.66

- Upper Upscale RevPAR up 5.3% to $125.17

 Top 5 Market QTD RevPAR Trends:

- Boston up 3.0%

- Chicago up 9.4%

- NYC up 3.9%

- SF up 7.2%

- DC down 5.6%

For the full pdf report, click here.

Trade in Thanksgiving football for a visit to the Amazon. Luxury river-cruise outfit Aqua Expeditions will arrange an unforgettable South American outing aboard one of its tricked-out water vessels before wining and dining guests with a Peruvian-inspired Thanksgiving meal. Spend the day photographing some of the area’s unique wildlife or meeting with fishermen of the Ucayali River and then sit down to a dinner of baked turkey stuffed with breadfruit, a starfruit chutney and cocona side dish and sweet humitas for dessert. Three-night itinerary (including meals and tours), from $2,700; 866-603-3687;aquaexpeditions.com.

Chef Flora Mikula is starting a new trend at the restaurant in the Auberge Flora hotel by inviting some of her favorite culinary masters to cook a meal in its kitchen. The first of these partnerships will take place on Thanksgiving Day, when Laurent Manrique, chef at the Carlton Hotel’s Millesime restaurant in New York, will be on hand to serve guests and locals alike a time-honored American culinary experience. Mikula and Manrique’s menu will feature turkey, stuffing and cranberry sauce as well as less traditional fare like a celery-and-pear soup. Rooms, from $178; dinner, from $60; 44 Bd. Richard Lenoir; 33-1/47-00-52-77; aubergeflora.fr.

At Wolfgang Puck’s first European restaurant, the world-renowned chef will celebrate Thanksgiving with a variety of additions to its steakhouse menu, which is particularly popular with London’s robust American population. Dinner on the day will feature a traditional meal of turkey with all the trimmings, plus quirky pie sliders (from pumpkin to pecan) and the 1863 cocktail (whiskey, port, lemongrass, ginger). “We wanted to create a special menu so our guests who are spending time in London on Thanksgiving could get a taste of home or an opportunity to experience an all-American tradition,” Puck explains. The pie sliders and cocktail will be available at Bar 45 from November 19 to 25. Rooms, from $610; dinner (excluding drinks), from $133; 45 Park Lane; 44-20/7493-4545; 45parklane.com.

For those in the air on the holiday who still crave a traditional meal, Etihad Airways—which will offer a Thanksgiving-themed menu aboard all of its flights on November 22—has it covered. In addition to Etihad’s regular meal program, those in business or first class can enjoy a traditional turkey platter entrée, complete with a chestnut soup starter and pumpkin pie to close.etihadairways.com.

A jaunt to the private island of Kamalame Cay is always about secluded, beachside luxury—and guests there at Thanksgiving can expect a meal starring the fruits and culinary traditions of the region. Dishes like fresh Andros stone crabs in a light yellow curry and wasabi mayo or a Jamaican-bread-and-roast-pumpkin pudding with dates and homemade vanilla ice cream drizzled with rum sauce may not be the normal turkey accompaniments, but they are certainly delicious. To make it even more adventurous, Kamalame Cay has just introduced half-day boat excursions to teach spearfishing. Rooms (including dinner), from $800; Staniard Creek, Andros; 876/632-3213;kamalame.com.

For some, the most exciting part of Thanksgiving isn’t eating the meal but actually making it. The cooking school at Marrakech’s La Maison Arabe will be administering lessons on how to put together a Thanksgiving meal using quintessential Moroccan techniques and flavors. On November 22, two classes of ten will get the lowdown on making pumpkin salad and a turkey tagine. If you’re after something less hands-on, Trois Saveurs, one of the property’s dining rooms, will serve Moroccan pumpkin soup and turkey stuffed with couscous and almonds. Cooking class, from $70; 1 Derb Assehbé, Bab Doukkala; 212-5/24-38-70-10; lamaisonarabe.com.

Restaurant 750 at lovely Montpelier Plantation & Beach has hosted a traditional Thanksgiving dinner for the past 11 years. The Relais & Châteaux property, a former sugar plantation situated at the bottom of Nevis Peak, a retired volcano, serves delicacies like local organic turkey, pumpkin pie made from native pumpkins and traditional stuffing. November is particularly pleasing here, when regular guests return for a while and the whole island throws open its doors. Winter at Montpelier brings cooking classes and after-dinner movies shown at Indigo, the recently renovated pool bar. Rooms, from $445; 869/469-3462; relaischateaux.com.

One-Ninety’s executive chef Giovanni Speciale has been offering Thanksgiving service to its patrons for a few years now. And with a menu that features mouthwatering plates of sweet-corn-and-king-crab croquettes, braised beef cheek, oven-roasted turkey and pumpkin pie with cinnamon ice cream, it is no surprise that this hotel restaurant is such a hit on the third Thursday of November. This year One-Ninety is rolling out a second menu, for vegetarians, with options like chestnut soup with brioche breadcrumbs and crispy chestnuts, plus a main course of roasted vegetable timbale. Rooms, from $380; dinner, from $70; 190 Orchard Blvd., Singapore; 65/6734-1110; fourseasons.com.

As a getaway destination, Balcones del Atlantico’s simple luxury on the Dominican Republic’s Samaná Peninsula could be the ideal spot for a late-fall escape. Porto, the resort’s open-air eatery, is an unorthodox Thanksgiving dinner option that focuses more on surf than turf. Most of the meal’s ingredients come from the markets in the nearby fishing village Las Terrenas, including local seafood, tropical fruits and produce. Served family-style, the menu features mahimahi ceviche, homemade hickory-smoked roasted whole chicken, steamed lobster with passion-fruit hollandaise sauce, whole roasted red snapper and a special pumpkin mousse. Rooms, from $275; Ctra. Las Terrenas, el Limon s/n; 877-412-7625; balconesdelatlantico.rockresorts.com.

Cape Town hosts South Africa’s biggest beer festival from November 23 to 25, which makes the capital city a distinctly delightful Thanksgiving port of call. But before you head out to partake, chow down at Reuben’s at One & Only Cape Town for a Thanksgiving meal with South African flair. The set menu offers three options for each course, including dishes like tomato soup with an oxtail-and-Parmesan beignet or the caramelized-onion-and-Parmesan tart. For the main event, each offering features unexpected twists that elevate a traditional Thanksgiving dinner. For instance, Reuben’s turkey entrée is poached in thyme and served with confit thigh and a compote of cranberry and Granny Smith apple, pumpkin dauphinoise and café au lait. Rooms, from $615; Dock Rd., Victoria & Alfred Waterfront; 27-21/431-5888;capetown.oneandonlyresorts.com.

This brand-new property opened in Siena in July with a slew of quaint countryside offerings, like mushroom foraging, pottery courses with local artists and vineyard harvesting on its sprawling 4,200-acre estate. Inside the restored 12th-century castle resides elegantly rendered boutique accommodations and Ristorante Tosca, its classic Italian dining venue featuring fresh local fare served under stunning Murano glass chandeliers. (The views of rolling Tuscan hills stretch as far as the eye can see.) The restaurant developed a special holiday menu that starts with a cranberry cocktail followed by pumpkin soup, Roquefort cheese tart and a roasted turkey stuffed with chestnuts and prunes. Rooms, from $800; dinner (excluding drinks), from $100; Località Querceto, 53031 Casole d’Elsa; 39-0577/961-501; castellodicasole.com.

(Resource: Departures)

We’ve noticed a few major changes in the New York hotel scene over the past year. First off,  prices are higher than ever. This is something that became quite obvious in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, with some hotels last week charging upwards of $300/night last week, even though rooms had no electricity, heat or hot water.

But then again, with both the WSJ and the NY Times agreeing that there’s a major “hotel boom” happening in New York right now, this was hardly surprising.

Secondly, Brooklyn is hotter than ever. And with good reason—head across the East River, and you’re likely to find more space, hipper crowds, and (relatively) low prices. For evidence of that, see #2 on our list.

And things are still heating up: last week, we learned of a new mega project going up in Times Square that will include a500-room hotel. Add to that, CitizenM, Virgin, Dorchester Collection, Edition, Public and SLS are all coming to NYC in the near future.

But enough recapping. Time for the list! Here’s a look at the best (according to us, anyway) hotels right now in NYC.

The Nomad

Designed by Jacques Garcia (La Mamounia, Delano Marrakech, Hotel Costes) the hotel’s gorgeous 168 rooms offer wooden floorboards, vintage ocean liner trunks and clawfoot tubs. Oh, and did we mention how much we love that wood-paneled library in the back of the lobby?

If you’re on the fence about venturing outside of your Manhattan bubble, let this Williamsburg gem give you the incentive you need. Located on a quiet block next to the East River, this 64-room hotel just oozes the reclaimed-materials, industrial-chic vibe that the hip neighborhood has become known for. Heck, it was even built inside an old textile factory!

This classy, uptown joint is where all the celebs stayed when they got evacuated from their plush downtown apartments—and we totally understand why. With an unforgettable black-and-white tiled lobby, Jean-Georges restaurant, and old-fashioned shoe shine kiosk, we kinda wish we had enough dough to visit this place more often!

The newest member to the Pod family debuted this fall, and its stellar rooftop quickly gained the midtown hotel a dedicated following. This month, the hotel plans to complete the final phase of its opening: the “Great Room” lobby and adjacent taco bar.

Set to open later this fall, the Jade is sure to make a splash with its French Art Deco-inspired interiors, unbeatable views of lower Manhattan, and quaint, Greenwich Village vibe.

As they say in real estate, it’s all about location. And you can’t do much better than this upscale, art-filled 184-room beauty located across from Bryant Park. We first fell in love with it two years ago, and the attraction hasn’t waned a bit.

After overcoming a few initial hurdles, we’re happy to report this downtown boutique hotel has matured nicely. Rates remain steady, the staff are friendly, and you can’t beat those Williamsburg Bridge-facing balconies!

Things sure have come a long way for this 463-room waterfront hotel, which used to be an Embassy Suites until Conrad swooped in last year and added some seriously awesome lobby art. Public spaces aside, the all-suite hotel offers great Hudson River views, and in the summer, the Loopy Doopy rooftop bar is the place to be if you wanna get drunk on boozy popsicles.

Demi Moore sulks here. The cast of Mad Men likes to party here. Movie geeks get cozy in the screening room. Clearly, the charm of this classic Soho hotel isn’t lost on many folks.

With the opening of the Barclays Center in September, the usefulness of this 128-room hotel increased times a hundred. Airy, light-filled rooms with hardwood floors mean you can enjoy that Justin Bieber concert and have a nice, clean place to sleep right around the corner.

We want to say we’re over the bright, peppy, cute-ness of this 270-room Soho hideout. But then again, its cool factor is hard to ignore: between nightlife hotspot Mister H and the sex parties that go on in the rooms, it’s clear people are still smitten with this place. 

(Source: HotelChatter)

From house-hived honey to freshly foraged mushrooms, ingredients at these sustainable operations don’t travel far to the table.

At Angavallen, located in southern Sweden, owner Rolf Axel Nordström allows heritage-breed pigs, chickens, cows and sheep to roam freely year-round over the farmland and hotel grounds. “It’s organic farming the way it’s been done for 70 years,” says Nordström, emphasizing that only regional farm stock, like his gray-and-black-spotted pigs and Swedish forest sheep, could thrive on his regimen of sustainable nonintervention. (Every August, for example, he lets the pigs into his fields to clean up the weeds.) Meanwhile, more than 20 full-time employees keep the farm running, which, with 130 sows, 200 sheep and 130 cows, produces more than enough stock for the seasonal tasting menus. One fall specialty is blood pudding, made to celebrate the traditional Swedish holiday of St. Martin’s Eve on November 10; other delicacies include veal, lamb, sausage, housemade cheeses, foraged mushrooms and eight varieties of mustard made from seeds grown on the property. Rooms, from $121; Norra Håslövs Byväg; 46-40/423-250; angavallen.se.

Number One, the Michelin-starred restaurant at the Balmoral Hotel, serves fresh Scottish produce all year but delves into the farm-to-table trend via old-fashioned foraging. Executive chef Jeff Bland and foraging expert Andy Fraser bring hotel guests to their favorite spots in the surrounding countryside to root around for wild Scottish girolle mushrooms, carrageen moss, pea flowers and elderberries. Bland then cooks an alfresco meal, pairing the gathered herbs and vegetables with locally sourced game. Number One’s seasonal menu varies, but autumn outings bring rose hips, hawthorn and blackthorn berries and plenty of mushrooms for the restaurant’s ratatouilles. Rooms, from $240; 1 Princes St.; 44-131/556-2414; thebalmoralhotel.com.

Nashville’s Capitol Grille in the Hermitage Hotel serves a seasonal menu supplied by its own grounds, the 66-acre farm at Glen Leven, which includes a biodynamic heirloom garden and a herd of heritage cattle. Executive chef Tyler Brown has the help of a cheerful volunteer staff, and about 80 percent of the harvest heads to his kitchen for immediate use or, as in the case of a bumper crop of green cherry tomatoes, pickling. Fall marked the first honey collection from the farm’s beehives, while a cattle herd that has tripled in size since February caused a stir by escaping their pasture and consuming seedlings for the planned fruit orchard. “It’s a steep learning curve,” Brown says of his farming exploits.Rooms, from $279; 231 Sixth Ave. N.; 615-244-3121;thehermitagehotel.com.

Seventy percent of the produce at Fairmont Yangcheng Lake comes from Yue Feng Organic Farm, a 200-acre spread of organic orchards and gardens situated along the edge of the surrounding protected body of water. A 30-member staff cultivates greens, squash, tomatoes, herbs, guava, loquat and citrus fruit for use in the hotel’s two restaurants, Yi Feng Court and Essence. Bi Luo Chun green tea, a Suzhou region specialty, grows among hives of wild local bees, which produce up to 90 pounds of honey a day—enough to satisfy afternoon tea service and the pastry chef. November welcomes guests from all over Asia eager to sample hairy crabs from the lake. The local delicacy, prized for its roe, is served steamed and dipped in dark vinegar. Rooms, from $141; 3668 W. Ma’anshan Rd.; 86-512/5780-0888; fairmont.com/yangcheng-lake-kunshan.

Sprawling over 75 acres on the slopes of Tanzania’s Ngorongoro Crater, Gibb’s Farm sits on an 80-year-old coffee plantation and has three decades of experience producing organic fruit, vegetables, coffee and meat. In its nose-to-tail system, 90 percent of kitchen ingredients come from the farm, and scraps are either composted or fed to the pigs, which in turn become salami and bacon in the smokehouse. More than 20 active beehives provide fresh honey and pollinate the heritage gardens, while six dairy cows produce enough milk for the cheese, butter, yogurt and ice cream enjoyed by guests. Chef Lisa Campbell’s “pick, clean and serve” approach centers on fresh, seasonal ingredients and relies on a team of 16 farmers and vegetable gardeners to harvest produce and tend the animals. The farm bustles all year, yielding 11,000 pounds of coffee between May and December and roasting the beans each morning for cups of joe in the dining room. Rooms, from $535; 757-428-1166;gibbsfarm.net.

Located on the outskirts of Seattle, Trellis restaurant at the Heathman Hotel is famous for a salad made with greens served within two hours of being harvested from a field 15 minutes away. Executive chef Brian Scheehser and a crew of four gardeners farm approximately seven acres of organic fruits and vegetables, including a 300-tree apple orchard that produces applesauce, gallons of cider and homemade cider vinegar. He raises each plant from a seed—a requirement for many of the antique bean and tomato varieties he favors, which are unavailable nearby—and is making room in his root cellar for this fall’s harvest: 4,000 pounds of winter squash, 25 gallons of honey from his hives and numerous flats of tomatoes preserved in cooperation with a local cannery. Scheehser also collaborated with Cherry Valley Dairy to create a duo of aged jack cheeses that will be ready in late winter—a blueberry-and-basil variety and a spicy pepper jack made from garden-grown peppers. Rooms, from $196; 220 Kirkland Ave.; 888-264-5494; heathmankirkland.com.

Executive chef Zachary Ladwig benefits not only from a location in the heart of Texas cattle country but also from an organic garden that sprouts more fruits, vegetables and herbs than his kitchen can possibly use. On its 313-acre property, the Inn at Dos Brisas maintains a 10-acre garden, an orchard of persimmon, pear, apple and pomegranate trees and two greenhouses. Farmer Lisa Roese grows up to 20 varieties of each vegetable, including heirloom tomatoes, basil and local favorites like wild dewberries and spilanthes (a mouth-numbing herb sometimes used as a toothache remedy). Ladwig plays with textures from the garden this season, serving a warm pumpkin salad with huckleberry, roasted pumpkin seeds and housemade ricotta cheese. Rooms, from $560; 10,000 Champion Dr.; 979-277-7750; dosbrisas.com.

Chef and owner Patrick O’Connell has focused on farm-to-table fare since opening the Inn at Little Washington more than 30 years ago—but these days he doesn’t need to reach much farther than his backyard for fresh ingredients. On a small orchard and two compact organic plots totaling a half acre, farmer-in-residence Joneve Murphy grows more than 125 produce varieties, working with seed traders to cultivate uncommon strains like blue tomatoes, pea-sized currant tomatoes for pickling and Japanese shishito peppers (O’Connell chars these and serves them with shrimp dishes in the dining room). Murphy says the garden paths draw curious guests, many of whom visit with the Rhode Island Red hens that hold court in their chandelier-adorned coop or the flock of sheep guarding Francesca the llama. “Guests come down when I’m working and say, ‘Oh, I had that for dinner last night,’” Murphy says. “They know the food is really fresh.” Rooms, from $425; 309 Middle St.; 540-675-3800; theinnatlittlewashington.com.

There is a secret to chef Christopher Kostow’s Michelin three-star restaurant at Meadowood: He grows tailored and hard-to-find produce in the hotel’s half-acre garden. “We’ll experiment with things we’re not sure we’ll like or that we can’t find anywhere else,” says gardener Christine Kim, who manages Meadowood’s organic garden and greenhouse, cultivating staples like heirloom tomatoes, sunchokes, radishes and microgreens along with exotic newcomers, such as tiny Mexican sour gherkin cucumbers and a water spinach so prolific, it requires a special planting permit. Plans to expand the henhouse are still in the works, but Meadowood’s current holdings of a dozen or so beehives, five chickens and a tribe of goats keep Kim busy. The plot inspires Kostow to feats of culinary creativity, like baking turnips in dirt from the garden—an innovation that Kim says “just happens from constantly seeing the vegetables in their context.” Rooms, from $600; 900 Meadowood Ln.; 707-963-3646; meadowood.com.

A largely self-sufficient property that cultivates meat, dairy and produce, Otahuna Lodge is the modern incarnation of the original sheep and cattle station that began more than a century ago. “We believe if you’re going to raise your own stock, you have an obligation to use the entire animal and raise them humanely,” says managing director Hall Cannon. Accordingly, pigs live in a tepee-like swine chalet, and nothing is wasted once the animals head to the butcher. Prosciutto, coppa, bacon and sausage come together in the estate’s newly converted outbuildings; another structure houses a mushroom laboratory of fungus-filled logs. Executive chef Jimmy McIntyre takes guests to the organic potager garden to harvest vegetables before preparing a fresh meal with farm-raised chicken, eggs and lamb or foraged wild porcini mushrooms that grow under the property’s massive English oaks. The farm’s original two-acre orchard includes apple, pear, quince and mulberry trees, as well as some showy Victorian varieties, like Uvedale’s St. Germains, which produce nearly inedible six-pound pears. Rooms, from $905; 224 Rhodes Rd.; 64-3/329-6333; otahuna.co.nz.

(Source: Departures)

The New York State Liquor Authority announced a number of measures meant to help businesses weather the effects of Hurricane Sandy. These include automatic extensions for licenses expiring in the next 60 days, free replacement licenses for paper documents lost in the storm, a 15 day extension to pay distributors, as well an extension to request an all night permit for New Year’s Eve. More information can be found on the SLA’s website.

(Source: Eater.com)

If you would like to file for an all night permit, contact:

Alexander Victor

Victor & Bernstein, P.C.
18 East 41^st Street, 10^th Floor
New York, New York 10017
Tel.: 212-486-6000
Fax: 212-486-8668

Email: avictor@victorbernstein.com

New York’s hip downtown set fled to the Upper East Side following the power failure caused by monster storm Sandy.

TriBeCa residents Naomi Watts and Liev Schreiberchecked into the Mark Hotel on East 77th Street with their sons late Tuesday after the power went out downtown.

Model Helena Christensen also fled her SoHo loft for the comfortable surroundings of The Mark, along withAnna Wintour who lost power at her West Village townhouse, as well as former French Vogue editorCarine Roitfeld.

Russell Crowe, ironically in town filming the Noah’s Ark epic “Noah,” also checked in yesterday, we’re told, among other big names spotted including Marc Jacobs, Kelly Ripa, J onah Hill and Emma Stone.

A spy told us, “The scene at The Mark was buzzing with big names escaping the downtown blackout. Emma Stone and Jonah Hill were at the bar, while Vladimir Restoin Roitfeld and André Balazs were at different tables in the restaurant.”

Alec Baldwin and wife Hilaria escaped to the luxurious Lowell Hotel on East 63rd Street after their SoHo place lost power, along with indefatigableHarvey Weinstein and wife Georgina Chapman, whose West Village townhouse was also plunged into darkness.

Over at the Loews Regency on Park Avenue wereHarold Ford Jr. and wife Emily, as well as former Miss Universe Dayana Mendoza. Sarah Jessica Parker was spotted last night at the Plaza Athenee.

And at the Carlyle were Vogue creative directorGrace Coddington and inseparable couple Mary-Kate Olsen and Oliver Sarkozy, fleeing their East 10th Street townhouse.

One celebrity who immediately stayed put was Katie Holmes, who we are told remained in her apartment at the Chelsea Mercantile with daughter Suri, with a source saying, “Katie and Suri stayed safe and calm by torchlight.” Previews for Holmes’ Broadway show “Dead Accounts” have been delayed a week by the storm.

[Source: NYPost]

In today’s hyper-competitive restaurant world, some of the most influential players are not in the front- or back-of-the-house. Behind many acclaimed chefs and restaurateurs are the designers, purveyors, suppliers, real estate developers, financial wizards and other talented pros that help launch a successful concept and keep it ahead of the pack.

Just such a group was assembled on October 12 for “Trade Talks 2012”during this fall’s New York City Wine & Food Festival. Their panel, titled “The Butcher, The Baker, The Candle Stick Maker,” featured these industry insiders:

• David Rockwell, architect, The Rockwell Group
• Pat LaFrieda Jr., meat purveyor, Pat LaFrieda Meats
• Steven Kamali, principal, Steven Kamali Hospitality
• Jonno Pandolfi, ceramicist/tabletop designer
• Melanie Dunea, photographer

With Jennifer Baum, founder and president of Bullfrog & Baum Public Relations as moderator, the panel shared their insights on how they make teamwork tick, the best ways of doing business and where their dreams are taking them next.

JB: How do you combine your own creative vision with what a chef or restaurateur thinks is best?
DR: Collaboration is very important. The best clients don’t rip out a lot of photos and tell me they want their restaurant to “look like that.” We have to find the “DNA” that integrates food, service and design. Most of all, don’t alienate the architect from the budget process.
SK: Functionality has to make financial sense. We sometimes have to reign in the big personalities in the business.
MD: You have to give the client what they want but also lure them into what I want.

JB: How did you get started?
JP: I found a niche as a ceramic artist who markets himself to chefs. No one else was doing it at the time, but when I approached high-end chefs and asked if they would purchase custom-designed plates, the response was very positive.
DR: I started as a theatrical designer and my first restaurant project was to renovate Le Perigord [the venerable New York City French restaurant]. I only had four weeks, so I brought in the scene shop from La Mama theater. Directors and chefs are similar—they are both interested in ideas and movement. Designing restaurants allows me to combine three of my favorites—dining, socializing and Broadway theater.
PLF: My first client asked for a custom burger blend for his restaurant, so I tweaked my grandfather’s recipe a bit and fulfilled his request. Word spread—mainly through bloggers—and more restaurants requested custom blends. I had to break from my grandfather’s way of doing business—delivering the same blend everywhere. These days, restaurants want to differentiate from their neighbors.

JB: What’s your advice for working behind the scenes?
PLF: As butchers, we want the restaurant to take credit for a great dish—not the meat man. For example, the restaurant NoMad got rave reviews for its roast chicken dish and some of the reviewers pointed out that it was sourced from Pat LaFrieda Meats. We didn’t want the credit—it was the chef who made it a signature. We prefer to stay behind the scenes.
DR: When it comes to the design of the space, we don’t want credit either. By the time a restaurant is finished, we’re on to something else anyway. It’s always been my policy to “stay curious” and move on to the next project.

JB: Can you share some tips for managing a restaurant project?
JP: Sometimes it’s necessary to be very “hands on.” For Nomad’s dinnerware, I had to drive back and forth to the factory in Ohio several times to supervise production and make sure everything was turning out the way it should.
DR: Table layout is very important to the success of a restaurant design. I encourage chefs and restaurateurs to move around the tables for several days in a row to understand and get a feel for the arrangement. I think about table layout as a “landscape.”
PLF: When developing a custom blend, I start by asking the chef what kind of steak they like to eat. The chef at Minetta Tavern, for instance, likes highly marbled dry aged beef, so that’s what we gave him for his burgers.

JB: Is there a key trend you’re tracking right now?
DR: A focus on local craftsmanship. This is tracking from upscale to less expensive restaurants. There are more opportunities to source design from local artisans, which also helps eliminate some lag time in the delivery of goods. You can get things to market faster.
PLF: Local sourcing is the buzz, but to select meat for all our different clients, we have to deal with thousands of small farmers from coast to coast. Supporting small family farms is more of a trend with us.

JB: Where are you headed next?
DR: I want to continue to take creative risks and get out of my comfort zone. Portability is what interests me now, like pop-up restaurants. Pop-ups celebrate something transient; environments that can morph and change. I’d love to do a restaurant that transforms into a cooking school. I’d also love to work for Alice Waters.
PLF: I would like to work with one small French bistro that has staying power. I’d take it over a restaurant chain anytime—I like working with the same customer every day over a lifetime. Chains have lots of changing of the guard.
JP: Right now, I’m getting away from traditional four-piece place settings, designing dinnerware that’s versatile with pieces that work together for different seasonal menus. I completed a project for 11 Madison Park along those lines—a 20-piece stoneware collection. Some day, I’d love to work with Morimoto.
SK: I’m excited about exploring different venues for restaurants. Airports are a natural, but we’re also working with galleries and other institutions. A restaurateur I always wanted to work with is Keith McNally.

(Source: MonkeyDish)

The Waiter”, Andy Warhol + Jean Michel Basquiat

Cock and Bull, Damien Hirst

Quo Vadis, London, UK 

TOP 10: ART IN RESTAURANTS

Casa Lever, New York

Rose Bar, New York

The Lion, New York

Cut, Beverly Hills

Café Habana, Malibu

Tru, Chicago

 Mr. Chow, International

 Four Seasons Restaurant, New York

Quo Vadis, London

Spago, Beverly Hills 

Industry Insider Steven Kamali’s                                                                                          Favorite Hangouts in NYC and The Hamptons

Steven Kamali might be best known for his red-hot Montauk properties like Ruschmeyer’s, The Surf Lodge, and Capri, but he’s got much more on his plate. He recently launched a chef staffing agency called The Chef Agency that takes advantage of his years in high-end F&B. He’s also opening a cafe with the gallerist Larry Gagosian. Yet he still enjoys visiting other dining spots when he has time, and he shared a few of his favorites in New York and “out east.” Take a look.

1. SOHO HOUSE

Luxe members-only club via London, dotted with the occasional celeb. Opulent environs dovetail with general posh decadence. Lounge about the 40-foot Chesterfield sofa and skinny dip in the infamous roof deck pool. Lux bedding, banana-leaf prints, and walnut floors. Kama Sutra in the bedroom drawers nice upgrade from Gideons. Too bad it’s all private: bypass those secretive membership rules via one of the $500/night guest rooms.

2. CASA LEVER

Sant Ambroeus comes to midtown, lays dowager-friendly Warhol silkscreens and striped carpeting over former Space Odyssey trip. Previous trillion-dollar Lever House build-out mostly still recognizable, although menu has fully flipped, now delivering Milanese classics. Crudo, pasta, fish entrées. Or just sit at the bar and sip a Milanese: vodka, amaro, and lemon.

3. PEELS

Joey Ramone Place sprouts a southern-accented diner from the Freemans crew. Versatile bi-level space with take-out counter, communal table, booths, bar. Stumptown coffee to get your heart started in the morning, fried chicken to clog it up at night. Hush puppies, succotash, Ozark ham help maintain cornpone cred. Dry-aged steaks for the players. Bright space is all New Bowery, more Hamptons than hey ho, let’s go.

4. RAOUL’S

OG Soho bistro keeps charming in dilapidated digs even as glitzier spots fall by the wayside. Classic for perfect steak au poivre, excellent risotto with scallops, and steamed artichokes munched by new faces models and regular folk alike. Unpretentious, always on point. Check the outdoor garden or semi-hidden loft for lurking low-key celebs. Busy bar scene adds to the allure, beware daunting steps to the bathroom after half a bottle of red.

5. TUTTO II GIORNO SOUTHAMPTON

Everything about the original Tutto Il Giorno in Sag Harbor was tiny except the wait to get in. Its days of being known as “Waverly East” may be over since an ownership change turned it into “Donna Karan’s daughter’s restaurant,” but a new second and larger space in Southampton should give the A-listers who frequent the restaurants like Mr. and Mrs. Matthew Broderick a bit more breathing room. Gabby Karan again designed the interior. iIn keeping with the general theme, the menu, while familiar, is expanded.

(Source: BlackBook)

Who’s cookin’?

How’s the restaurant industry in New York? Steven Kamali, the hospitality consultant, says the sluggish economy is not impacting hiring rates.

“It’s an incredibly robust period. Hiring has not slowed down, nor has the redevelopment of existing hotels and the development of new ones, which is creating new opportunities for culinary talent across the globe.”

He recently launched an affiliate company of Steven Kamali Hospitality called The Chef Agency, to help hotels and restaurants recruit talent, including general managers and chefs. He has a database of 6,000 international chefs.

Kamali has placed Eric Basulto as executive chef at W Hoboken, and his list of clients includes Michael Mina, David Burke and Stephen Starr.

Kamali projects fees from the Chef Agency to pass $2 million annually next year. —Julie Earle-Levine

(Source: New York Post)

(Source: Gotham Magazine)

(Source: Hospitality Design)

Hotel food-and-beverage programs are an important way to enhance the marketability and profit margins of a hotel operation. Quality F&B options not only enhance the level of perceived service a hotel has to offer, but also allow an opportunity to further brand the hotel by developing unique concepts that complement the tastes and preferences of the guests the hotel aims to attract.

But when it comes to structuring F&B operations, hotel operators have to decide whether to handle the program internally or hire a third party to operate these services.

1. Overhead costs
Hotel operators that decide to manage their own F&B programs often run into exorbitant start-up costs, depending on the scope of the renovation and equipment needed. These costs can range anywhere from $500,000 up to $1.5 million. By partnering with an outside restaurateur, hoteliers have the opportunity to outsource the majority of these costs to the operator, alleviating major budgetary constraints while taking advantage of the increase in traffic and sales to the hotel property. In some instances, the hotel operator may opt to pay for tenant improvements to incentivize partnerships with outside operators. It’s important to structure a deal that will be mutually beneficial to both parties, ensuring costs are well managed.

2. Staffing
As most hotel managers know, finding and training the right staff can be an extremely tedious task. It takes time and energy to ensure all F&B positions are filled by qualified candidates.

When partnering with an outside operator, the burden of filling these positions is placed on the outsourced party. The restaurant operator also becomes responsible for paying out salaries for these positions, rather than coming directly from the hotel’s revenue stream. This frees the hotel from overhead obligations that can become burdensome and allows greater cash flow that can then be reinvested in additional hotel amenities.

One important point to note, however, is ensuring the staff hired by the restaurant is well versed in the service standards of the hotel in which it operates. The service standards should appear seamless throughout the hotel’s guest offerings. Because the outsourced restaurant operator is responsible for hiring staff that will be actively interacting with guests, it will be beneficial for them to undergo the same training course given to the rest of the hotel’s staff. Ensuring the service standards of the restaurant are up to par with the hotel’s internal standards is an absolute necessity for a successful partnership.

3. Traffic and sales
The main reason restaurants and hotels look to partner up is to enhance traffic, and ultimately sales, of each business. The hotel benefits by being able to offer a comprehensive F&B program without the additional costs and overhead of handling these services in house. This also leads to higher averages in the daily rate and occupancy when there is a strong F&B option in place.

The restaurant, on the other hand, benefits from having a built-in customer base. With at least 100 rooms or more sitting atop the restaurant, there is a secure client base for the restaurant to serve.

4. Branding
Partnering with an outside restaurant operator allows the hotel to appeal to more market segments. Not only do they benefit from offering their own client base a dining experience, but also they have the opportunity to appeal to the restaurant operator’s market base as well. This has a synergistic effect that ends up boosting the appeal of both businesses.

There are many concepts hoteliers can choose for restaurant operations. However, it is important the chosen concept, and operator, complements the hotel’s branding and works to not only satisfy its client base but also extends to others within their market segment. With the hotel industry becoming an increasingly competitive landscape, operators will look to F&B programs as a way to further enhance their brand identity and offer a truly unique guest experience.

(Source: HotelNewsNow.com)

Every so often, the tectonic plates of mainstream musical taste shift. In the 1960s, there was the British Invasion, followed by disco in the 1970s and the rise of glam metal in the 1980s. The 1990s saw the advent of grunge and the resurgence of boy bands, followed by hip-hop’s hegemony in the 2000s. Now, the tables are turning again.

Electronic dance music, better known as EDM, has finally surged from its underground roots and into mainstream consciousness. One need only look at the recent activities of the genre’s most prominent practitioners: last year, Skrillex was one of the main attractions at Coachella; last month, Deadmau5 ended up on the cover of Rolling Stone; last week, Kaskade became the first electronic act to sell out the Staples Center in Los Angeles.

 “I think mainly people were just ready to hear something new,” says Kaskade. “My parents listened to rock and roll; that’s their music. And then hip-hop came along. This is the next generation of music.”

Just as international recognition enriched the likes of The Beatles, The Bee Gees, Aerosmith, Nirvana and Jay-Z, EDM’s practitioners have been cleaning up of late, prompting FORBES to release its first-ever Electronic Cash Kings list. Over the past 12 months, the world’s ten highest-paid DJs pulled in $125 million—more than the payroll of the Los Angeles Lakers.

Dutch born DJ Tiesto tops the list with earnings of $22 million, buoyed by an average nightly gross of $250,000 according to concert data provider Pollstar. Grammy-winning California native Skrillex ranks second with $15 million, followed by Scandinavian trio Swedish House Mafia, which recently disbanded despite pulling in an estimated $14 million.

“I’ve been listening to electronic music since I was 12,” says Skrillex. “Even when I played in rock bands, I’ve been making it … This is the first time it’s gotten so big.”

It’s not just the top three acts making all the money. French DJ David Guetta claims the No. 4 spot with $13.5 million, buoyed by last year’s pop crossover Nothing But The Beat and endorsements with Renault and HP; Steve Aoki, who played over 200 shows in the past year, rounds out the top five at $12 million. Other DJs on the top ten include the aforementioned Kaskade and Deadmau5, as well as Afrojack, Avicii and Jersey Shore’s DJ Pauly D.

Though these Electronic Cash Kings hail from all over the globe, they’ve got at least one thing in common: they all make the bulk of their money by touring. Often toting nothing more than a USB stick and a pair of Pioneer CDJs, their production costs are often negligible, unlike rockers and pop stars who typically take home just one-third of gross ticket sales.

Our estimates include earnings from these live shows—for many artists, that often means more than $100,000 for a night’s work—and from recorded music sales, endorsements, merchandise sales and, in the case of DJ Pauly D, television (we included him on this list because, like his fellow Electronic Cash Kings, he makes at least half his cash from DJ gigs). Sources include Pollstar, RIAA, promoters, managers, lawyers and some of the artists themselves.

Dance Dance Revolution

Though the term “electronic dance music” is relatively new, electronic music has been around for decades, first gaining popularity through influential early acts like Kraftwerk in the 1970s. So what accounts for the recent rise of EDM? Many prominent DJs credit the new avenues of spreading information that have cropped up in the past few years.

“I think what really changed was social media,” says Tiesto. “Twitter, Facebook really helped a lot. It exposed things to a whole new world. Before that you only could hear [electronic dance music] on the radio at night. Day-time radio would never play it.”

Perhaps more importantly, EDM has found a home in the festival circuit. Concert promoters like AEG, the parent company of Coachella producer Goldenvoice, discovered that they could tap into the burgeoning electronic scene by adding top DJs to their lineups—and what started out as a sideshow soon became the main attraction.

“The Coachella music festival served as microcosm in the evolution of electronic dance music from a niche into a mainstream format,” says AEG chief Randy Phillips. “EDM translates more successfully as a consumer experience in the open field festival environment or in a general admission [or] flat floor venue than it does in large arenas with fixed seats. Efforts to tour EDM stars in arenas across North America have proven to yield uneven results outside of a handful of major markets.”

One of those markets is Las Vegas, where casino mogul Steve Wynn has signed a group of Electronic Cash Kings–including Tiesto, Skrillex and David Guetta–to residencies at his properties; he also started a joint label with Ultra Records to release electronic music. Other billionaires including Ron Burkle are said to be keen on getting a slice of the electronic pie as well. And why shouldn’t they try? DJs are quickly becoming the rock stars of their generation—and now they’re getting paid as such, too.

“Dance music is pretty close to where rock was 50 years ago,” says Afrojack, who ranks ninth on our list with $9 million. “And rock has never died. So I’m sure the same [goes for] dance music.” 

                                                                 Tiesto- $22 million

                                                               Skrillex- $15 million

                                                      Swedish House Mafia- $14 million

                                                           David Guetta- $13.5 million

                                                            Steve Aoki- $12 million

                                                             Deadmau5- $11.5 million

                                                            DJ Pauly D- $11 million

                                                               Kaskade- $10 million

                                                               Afrojack- $9 million

                                                                 Avicii- $7 million

(Source: forbes.com)

                                                         :: SKH DINNER AT NOBU ::

                                       :: WHERE’S KAMALI? SKH DOES FLYWHEEL! ::

                                                                :: WE SURVIVED! :: 

                                :: BERNARD LOVES HIS L’OREAL LOTION SPF 30 ::

                                                                      :: BONDING! ::

          :: Karma hasn’t anyone ever told you… NEVER BE THE FIRST TO FALL ASLEEP!! ::

When we got a sneak peek at the new look of The Roger Hotel in Manhattan we were a little giddy over the logo which is a simple black bow tie. Even though the logo is plastered everywhere and on everything, we still liked it.

And it got us thinking of two other hotels that sport the bow tie look. Over at The Plaza in New York, the toiletries are outfitted with black bow ties around the tops while at Mr. C. Beverly Hills, Mr. C himself sports a ginormous bow tie for the hotel’s logo which is found throughout the hotel including the bath towels and the toiletries. And down in New Orleans at the W French Quarter a recent room renovation included the addition of bowtie pillows.

Steven Kamali, who was behind the Roger’s reinvention, tells us why they decided to cap off the new look with a bow tie:

The bowtie symbolized a level of sophistication and class. It added a personal touch and figurative personality to the brand.  It also symbolized a transcendence of style from one generation to the next - something classic, is now, hip and modern.

Now four hotels with bow ties is still a pretty slim argument for this being the hot new trend but well, we can hope can’t we?

(Source: hotelchatter.com) 

First there were pop-up boutiques, with their short-term leases injecting new life into vacant storefronts. Then came pop-up restaurants, as itinerant chefs began borrowing the kitchens of their vacationing comrades. But, oddly enough, it is the hotel industry that is taking the here-today-gone-tomorrow concept to a new extreme. To coincide with the Summer Olympics, England’s Snoozebox is erecting a temporary 320-room hotel out of shipping containers in a park 90 minutes northeast of London. Each room comes with a bathroom, an air-conditioning unit, a key card and wi-fi access, and the whole hotel can be assembled—and ready for guests to check in—within three to four days of arriving at a new location.

Snoozebox, which rents its rooms for $100 to $300 a night and was valued at nearly $35 million on the London Stock Exchange in May, installed a similar pop-up on the grounds of Windsor Castle for the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee, and in August it will move on to the Edinburgh International Festival. The company’s rivals are relocating for concerts and car races, with some, including the Pop-Up Hotel, based in Somerset, England, modeling their custom-designed canvas tents after those you might find on luxury safaris. Across the pond in California, Shelter Co. this spring began offering offbeat brides—and anyone else looking to have an elegant soire in the woods—tents outfitted with 400-thread-count sheets, down comforters, coolers of wine and prices on a par with the Four Seasons’. Weekend rates begin at $750.

Snoozebox and its lower-impact brethren provide truly portable lodging. But another pop-up purveyor is doing something sneakier: renting out existing hotels, stocking them with organic bath products and maybe some new throw cushions and then jacking up the prices. That’s essentially what Berlin-based Design Hotels did in May when it took over the San Giorgio Beach Hotel on the Greek island of Mykonos for this year’s high season. To spruce up the beachfront property, which was built in the 1990s and is a few hundred yards from a big nightclub, decorators brought in wicker chandeliers, director’s chairs and sea-grass rugs and renamed the place San Giorgio Mykonos.

“You can spin hotels around that have great bones but are getting really tired,” says Design Hotels CEO Claus Sendlinger, whose company’s 231 hotels include the prestigious Gramercy Park Hotel in New York City and the Dolder Grand in Zurich. The website for the revamped San Giorgio has pictures of straw hats slung over chair backs and emphasizes the hotel’s ability to help travelers with “relaxing from their daily life and just being themselves.” “Through the images we use and the language we use, it attracts the creative class,” says Sendlinger. (And by “creative class,” he means people who are willing to rough it for $189 a night.)

Design Hotels’ first pop-up experiment, in Tulum, Mexico, took over the 15-year-old Cabanas Copal last December. For six-months, the company renamed the Copal’s 85 cabanas the Papaya Playa Project, talked up its “panfried” fish and locally grown aloe vera and raised room prices from an average of $60 per night to $100. During a weeklong stay in January, Kevin Gallagher, a Web designer from Langhorne, Pa., who had vacationed at the Copal three times before, was surprised by what he got in return for the higher prices. “One night they brought in a lounge singer from Berlin, sort of cabaret meets Burning Man,” he says. “But as far as the basics, some of it was lacking.” There was only one sun bed on the beach and a few stray umbrellas, so he and his wife parked themselves on towels. Also absent was the Copal’s customary roving waiter to take drink orders.

So when Gallagher got home, he logged on to a travel site and warned prospective visitors about the minimalist makeover. “At first we thought somehow the cabanas were bigger,” he wrote on the site. “Then it hit us. There were no chairs or tables.” Eventually he and his wife figured out the beds were smaller too.

That’s where the key difference between a pop-up hotel and a temporary boutique comes in. “For a pop-up store, you’re there for an hour,” says Julie Sturgeon, a travel agent in Indianapolis. “With a pop-up hotel, you’re there for 24 hours or more, so customers have time to be critical.”

Then again, if a pop-up flops because of problems with the marketing materials or customer service, everything can be rebranded with minimal effort. That’s exactly what Design Hotels is getting ready to do. In September it will rent out the Copal again, this time for a seven-week stint as a yoga retreat. At least with its newest name, PopUp Ashram, the guests won’t be expecting anything posh.

In England, the Pop-Up Hotel is borrowing a page from Africa’s luxury safaris by setting up custom-designed canvas tents for car races, concerts and other outdoor events.

For the London Olympics, Snoozebox is using shipping containers to build of of its 320-room hotels that take only a few days to assemble and include air-conditioning, flat-screen TVs and wi-fi.

Berlin-based Design Hotels started its first pop-up last winter by renting a 15-year-old hotel in Tulum, Mexico, doing a little redecorating and renaming the place the Papaya Playa Project for six months.

Deisgn Hotels turned to Greece for its second pop-up, renting the San Giorgio Beace Hotel on Mykonos during the high season and emphasizing its new minimalist chic. 

(Source: www.time.com) 

Hotelier and hospitality consultant Steven Kamali has orchestrated significant changes to the Roger—formerly known as Hotel Roger Williams. The hotel is owned by JRK Hotel Group, whose president, John Flannigan, hired Kamali to rebrand the hotel.

The rebranding grew out of an imaginary character and son to Roger Williams, Roger Jr. Inheriting the hotel from his father, Roger Jr. balances the classic, historical nature of the property while providing a casual chic perspective.

Upgrades to the hotel include the Parlour, curated by Kamali and designed by Anna Busta to blend modern elements with old world touches. Kamali also developed new F&B concepts, including a full bar lounge and an intimate dining space on the mezzanine level that’s based on the modern American bistro. In addition, refurbished guestrooms were unveiled in June.

(Source: hospitalitydesign.com) 

Brooklyn, once thought of as the ugly stepchild to the main attractions of Manhattan, is now giving the island a run for its money. Tourism no longer exists only within the confines of Midtown and SoHo, but reaches into Williamsburg, and even towards deeper neighborhoods of Brooklyn, such as Bedford Stuyvesant.

Wanting something slightly less “cookie cutter” than the Empire State building, young travelers are spilling over into the specialty restaurants and thrift shops of Bedford Avenue. Take the Hotel Williamsburg, for example—a boutique hotel that offers four bars to its hip 20-somethings. Or the King & Grove group, known for their “hipster chic” hot spots in the Hamptons like Ruschmeyer’s and Surf Lodge, and their rumored expansion over the bridge.  

Just like the Meatpacking District was once home to a bevy of prostitutes, a few smart investors gambled on the risky real estate and were able to transform the area into designer shops, high-end restaurants and the top of the line hotels. Now, to be located in the Meatpacking District means that you are, perhaps, of a higher standard or level of luxury.

Could there be a similar fate for Brooklyn’s up-and-coming neighborhoods? The evidence seems to be pointing towards yes.

The move towards social media to benefit the hotel business has been a fast and furious one, but choosing the right social media outlets, and optimizing them to your brand, can have far more advantages than simply spreading yourself thin on every platform imaginable. So, how do you choose what’s right for you? 

Many hotel brands immediately gravitated towards Facebook as their main platform, introducing easy online bookings and referrals through the site. However, while Facebook may direct higher numbers for customers, it acts as a closed network, and is more a collective of outside viral content rather than a producer of new content. This means that the customers interacting are most likely already familiar with the brand.

On the other hand, open networks that create content, like Twitter, allow users to find your brand without previous knowledge of it. Twitter interaction works like a chain reaction; your brand name can build and build with frequent usage.

The bottom line? Test what works for your brand, focus, then optimize. Or in other words as the saying goes, “Make new friends, but keep the old.” 

It’s no surprise that Steven Kamali, owner of East End staples like The Capri and Ruschmeyer’s has an opinion when it comes to Hamptons hotspots. Steven shared his favorite spots throughout the South Fork with us:

Favorite Restaurant – Nobu at The Capri(281 County Road 39A, Southampton, 504-6575)—totally casual and fun.
 
Favorite Nightlife –  Ruschmeyer’s (161 Second House Road, Montauk, 668-8249)! Where else can you feel like a kid at summer camp again?

Favorite Event of the Summer – My daughter just turned one, so our morning swim in the pool is the best part of my day….
 
Favorite Farm Stand – Serene Green(3980 Noyac Road, Sag Harbor, 334-6311) on Noyac in Sag Harbor offers the most amazing fruits and vegetables.

Favorite Place to Shop – St. Peter’s Catch (58 S. Erie Ave., Montauk, 668-7100) has an incredible assortment of fresh fish—all you’d ever need for a great night barbecuing at home.

Favorite Best-Kept Secret – Dreamy Blend coffee in the general store at Sylvester & Co. (103 Main St., Sag Harbor, 725-5012).

(Source: hamptons-magazine.com)

Find the ultimate in preflight comfort at these ten airport lounges that beg you to stay awhile. 

Ironically, the greatest trials of air travel often occur in the few hours before takeoff. The process should be simple, really: show up at the airport, flash a passport, drop bags and board the plane. But this hasn’t been the case for years, abandoned sometime in the bucolic 1960s amid concerns for safety, heightened security and the democratization of travel.

Travel is meant to be a rich experience, a means of engaging with culture, cuisine, and pleasure. In the last decade cities around the world have helped this along by building exceptionally designed, clean, well-functioning airports—consider the brightly painted struts and wood ceilings of Madrid-Barajas or the soaring, glass-roofed spaces of Incheon International in South Korea. Along with them have come equally stunning airport lounges, and the super-luxe first-class areas in international hubs around the world are a testament to this new age of luxury.

Instead of feeling like the wrong side of a quarantine—and serving decidedly lack-luster food (everyone’s had a run-in with those dreaded airport “panini”)—these lounges are oases offering first-rate amenities, privacy and calm. It’s all so good, in fact, you might even want to get to the airport early.

Consider how much improved an airport experience would be if you had an entire terminal to yourself, as at the Premium Terminal at Doha International, which is operated by Qatar Airways. A nearly 100-foot-tall vertical garden (not to mention a Payot Paris day spa) greets passengers at Qantas’s First Lounge at Sydney Airport, and thoughtful elements (noise-dampening felt walls, Marimekko tableware, elegant Finnish and Nordic furniture designs) mark the Finnair Lounge at Helsinki Airport. Freshly made Japanese noodles or a true fine-dining experience at restaurant Haven can be had at The Pier at Hong Kong International Airport.

Airports are gateways to the world, and these ten airport lounges cater to global travelers who want the journey to be as memorable as the destination.

Virgin JFK Clubhouse, John F. Kennedy International Airport, New York

The feeling that half of Manhattan has joined you at your gate at JFK is over. This March, Virgin Atlantic premiered its new Clubhouse with an Austin Powers–meets–uptown mod cocktail lounge at its heart, complete with a red leather sofa and purple lighting. But it’s the Clubhouse Spa, featuring Dr. Hauschka products and treatments, that really makes the JFK Clubhouse a standout layover option. In the end, just like the $17 million flagship at Heathrow airport, this lounge offers everything you need (massages, facials, foot treatments), everything you didn’t know you needed (a Bumble and Bumble salon) and several things that you don’t really need at all but are certainly nice to have (anyone for a game of pool?). Beyond TSA checkpoint in A Concourse, above boarding gates A4 and A5; virgin-atlantic.com.

British Airways Concorde Room, Heathrow Airport

The decidedly unfashionable herringbone print, velvets and crystal chandeliers of the Concorde Room at Heathrow recall a well-to-do British gentleman’s study in all its relaxed, un-modern glory. Quite simply, this is a retreat—albeit one with full waiter service, complimentary wines and Champagne and private, hotel-style cabanas with day beds and en-suite bathrooms. If retreating isn’t your habit, book a theater ticket with the concierge and head to the terrace for a drink from the fabulous Concorde Bar and views of the runway. Terminal 5; britishairways.com.

Etihad’s Diamond First Class Lounge, Abu Dhabi International Airport

To enter Etihad’s first class lounge is a dangerous game of choose-your-own-indulgence. Leave the kids at the door. Staff nannies keep little ones busy in the kids’ retreat among colorful beanbags and toys; parents head to the Six Senses Spa for a complimentary treatment. Then the real decision-making begins. Will it be the Champagne bar for the finest wines and bubbly or the cigar lounge? À la carte dining in a fine-dining atmosphere or dinner at the chef’s table? Just don’t forget the kids. Terminal 3; etihadairways.com. 

Finnair Lounge, Helsinki Airport

From felt walls that swallow outside noise to Marimekko tableware to the wireless, mobile phone–charging system PowerKiss (wireless!), the simplicity and thoughtfulness of the Finnair Lounge makes it exceptional. A buffet is always on, and in addition to the views, the elegant Finnish and Nordic furniture designs provide their own easy pleasure. For those on the way to Asia, the midnight buffet is particularly elaborate. Travelers in need of a spa will need to have patience—the Finnair Spa (complete with traditional Finnish saunas) will reopen this winter, but in the meantime there are showers at the lounge. Terminal T2 between Gates 36 and 37; finnair.com.

Lufthansa First Class Terminal, Frankfurt Airport

Lufthansa’s First Class Terminal offers its own passport control and security checkpoints, so travelers get personal attention all the way until they walk down the gangplank to the airplane. (Behind security in Departure Area B, there is also a smaller but no less elegant first class lounge for non-Schengen flights.) Creatively done lighting radiates from behind a black glass wall and from the tops of marble partitions in the restaurant. Everything, from the size of the tables to the marble and oak bar to the monsoon showerheads, is presented generously and thoughtfully. Next to Terminal 1; lufthansa.com.

The Pier, Hong Kong International Airport

The seasoned traveler will be forgiven for any long-standing preconceptions about eating (or, sadly, not eating) in airports. Thankfully, not far from Gate 62 at Hong Kong International, those expectations will be overturned. At The Pier—Cathay Pacific’s glass-enclosed first- and business-class break area—you’ll find freshly made Japanese noodles at the Noodle Bar and proper fine dining and modern decor at the first-class Haven restaurant. (There are also two more fully stocked café/bars.) In addition to the business centers, the WiFi, the leather armchairs and the pebbled showers, a glass of Champagne also goes a long way to ease travel stress. Gates 62–66, Northwest Concourse; cathaypacific.com.

Qantas First Lounge, Sydney Airport

Modernity, with polished surfaces, clear glass and stainless steel, is the norm of airport luxury today, give or take a Dutch modern knock-off table or two and a leather armchair. Which is why we’re thrilled with the 98-foot, 8,400-plant vertical garden that greets passengers at the Qantas First Lounge at Sydney Airport. It leaves the air in the atrium feeling cleaner and lighter. Better yet, part of the garden is incorporated into each of the Payot Paris day spa treatment rooms, so you can forget, for the moment, that you’re in transit. The upper floor of the lounge, designed by Marc Newson and replete with recliners and sofas (in addition to those leather armchairs), also includes an open kitchen restaurant serving food by Australian chef Neil Perry. International Terminal; qantas.com.au.

Qatar Airways Premium Terminal, Doha International Airport

Doha airport knows how to do things on a massive scale better than anyone, which is why Qatar Airways worked with it to create this first- and business-class terminal cum mall cum hotel. It includes a handful of worthwhile airport elements (duty-free, fine boutiques) and complements them with the fundamentals of a fine lounge (a full-service Elemis spa, including Jacuzzi and sauna; several restaurants, cafés and bars; private meeting rooms and business centers). Hotel-style bedroom suites and child entertainment round out the offerings, and the result is truly over the top. Near Main Departures Building; qatarairways.com.

Singapore Airlines SilverKris Lounges, Singapore Changi International Airport

At Singapore Changi International, as throngs of travelers roll handcarts piled high with suitcases to overflowing check-in lines, Passenger Relations Officers greet first-class passengers of Singapore Airlines curbside, taking their bags, guiding them to an armchair in the first-class check-in lounge and checking them in personally. Next it’s off to the first-class SilverKris Lounges, where, depending on their mood, guests can choose from meeting rooms, café/bars or 13 Italian-leather slumberettes. Don’t worry—the staff will wake you before your flight. Terminal 2 on Level 3 (North Wing); Terminal 3 on Level 3; singaporeair.com.

Swiss Lounge, EuroAirport Basel Mulhouse Freiburg

Guests of the Swiss Lounge can sun themselves under an enormous glass dome, surrounded by bright, simple materials—like chrome and wood—rather than some of the richer, upholstered surfaces found in other first class lounges. The architecture is open, the greenery is plentifuland the staff at the welcome desk is attentive. Expect warm and cold buffets, leather recliners facing the panoramic windows, a proper European bar and a Japanese bridge in an atrium surrounded by palm trees. Somehow, it all works together impeccably—Priority Pass just voted it the best airport lounge of 2012. Y Terminal on the Departures Level; swiss.com.

(Source: departures.com)

From collaborations, to sponsorships, to creative cooperation, partnering up with a non-competitive, complementary brand can be an asset in differentiating you from the competition to your target customers. Here are some simple tips when picking out the right partner:

1. Find what assets you have to leverage. The partnership needs to be mutually successful to be balanced, as both parties need to bring something to the table.

2. Identify whom you are targeting. Who exactly are the specific customers you are trying to reach with this partnership?

3. Pick a partner that makes sense—research brands that your customers can identify with or recognize, and create a list of the best matches.

4. Fully understand your partner’s goals and begin a dialogue. What is the main thing they want out of the partnership? Driving up sales? Raising brand awareness?

5. Establish your currency. Is it a number of rooms a night? Or is it something else?

6. Build your database. Sending out a cooperative message or promotion will gain a larger market for both parties.

An example of a successful partnership includes WeSC (We Are the Superlative Conspiracy), a young, hip clothing and accessories brand, teaming up with The Standard hotels, a group known for it’s playful sensibility. By combining their images, they created items travelers might need for everyday life such as wallets, passport holders, iPhone covers, and premium retro style headphones, all in different colors representing each of the hotels color identity. In this case, The Standard is reasserting their “cool” image, (as the often do by promoting up-and-coming music), eventually appealing to the 35 and under market.

Another example includes Marriott International and it’s strategic partnerships with Christie’s; Tumi; Keri Glassman, a nutritionist; Aromatherapy Associates; and Treasury Wine Estates, as part of the brand’s initiative to deliver a higher-level luxury experience at JW Marriott hotels worldwide.

“We’re making an effort to drive awareness among luxury consumers. One way is through our partnerships,” Mitzi Gaskins, vice president of JW Marriott said in June of 2011. “We want to align ourselves with people in a space relevant to our consumers. Our goal is offer unique experiences and knowledge to our guests.”

Additionally, having an understanding of what your goals are can help you formulate how many partnerships you pursue—it can be as small as getting more people to attend an event you are throwing at your venue, or as big as driving sales, depending on what holes you may be looking to fill in your brand. As mentioned before, each deal must create a form of “currency,” whether it be a higher RevPAR or reaching a market that you have yet tapped, and so on. The point being, whatever the “currency” may be, it should be beneficial to both sides.

In turn, if one side, or both sides, is not receiving their expected “currency” it may be time to go separate ways. Partnerships should be viewed as a way to bring a fresh view to your brand; so trying out new partnerships (rather than only using the same ones over and over) should be the goal.

Furthermore, the most successful scenarios are achieved when a marketing partnership brings two brands together and reaches out to their respective customers with a cooperative message and/or offer. Collecting customers’ names and information will eventually equal a valuable currency, both in your direct consumer marketing efforts and also in your further partnership possibilities.

Overall, alliances between brands can be a highly effective tool in expanding your market at a low cost, and are a way to make your brand stand out amongst the competition. 

(Source: nytimes.com, hotelexecutive.com)

This summer marks the 73rd anniversary of the 1939 World’s Fair, an event that would change the New York dining world forever. Here’s a look back at all the wonderful things that the visitors to the fair ate and drank at this epic summer spectacle.

The World’s Fair was organized by a team of retired NYC policemen as a way of lifting the country’s spirits after the Great Depression. The effort was spearheaded by former Police Commissioner Grover Whalen, who served as the president of the New York World’s Fair Corporation. After four years of planning, the fair opened on April 30, 1939 on a plot of land in Queens that was formerly used as an ash dump.

The introduction to the official World’s Fair pamphlet ended with these encouraging lines:

To its visitors the Fair will say: “Here are the materials, ideas, and forces at work in our world. These are the tools with which the World of Tomorrow must be made. They are all interesting and much effort has been expended to lay them before you in an interesting way. Familiarity with today is the best preparation for the future.

The fair celebrated newness and international cooperation at every turn. In this spirit, the grounds were filled with exhibits that showcased developments in food science, and also restaurants where visitors could taste dishes from all around the world.

Food Exhibits:

The Food Building featured an exhibit that covered the previous 150 years of food science and inovation in America. A Times reporter noted that the “exhibit makes use of surrealistic dioramas and giant geometric forms which look like something out of an H.G. Wells fantasy of the future.” The centerpiece of the darkened exhibit hall was a 60-foot-wide egg-shaped display:

There one sees a moving chain of winged lobsters, a great transatlantic aqueduct which spills roses into a desert, an avocado with five jewels glowing from its skin and a clock which races madly backward from inside an opened tin can.

This mysterious sight is explained by a voice which says, “this is the kind of world your great-great grandmother would imagine we lived in if she were told of our countless achievement in food.” 

The Borden’s Dairyland exhibit showcased the latest in cow-milking technology. The Continental Baking building, which was designed to look like a bag of Wonder Bread, featured demonstrations about how various Continental products were made. The Kraft Foods exhibit illustrated how its products were processed using machines that had human-like fingers. And the Beech Nut building featured displays that educated guests on how coffee was grown and produced — it also had an elaborate circus diorama with tiny acrobats, clowns, and animals.

American Restaurants: 
There were 40 sit-down restaurants scattered across the grounds, as well as 261 individual refreshment stands, most of which served burgers, franks, sodas, and dairy products for 10 cents or less.

The fair hosted four Brass Rail restaurants, each of which had tables and dining bars. The Schaefer Center was one of the largest restaurants at the fair — it served multi-course meals from $1.35 - $2.75, as well as American staples, a la carte. Its menu was similar to that of an upscale steakhouse, with items like grilled sirloin steak ($2.25), chopped tenderloin ($90), and roast beef ($1.75). Guests could enjoy regional specialties from all across America at Ballantine’s Three Ring Inn. The fair also had a branch of Chicago’s Toffenetti restaurant, which offered a number of roasted and grilled meat dishes. And the Turf Trylon Club was one of the most expensive and popular restaurants at the fair.

For affordable eats, guests could visit the Mayflower Tested Quality Donuts pavilion, or a branch of the popular Childs chain of restaurants, which served 22 plate lunches. The massive Casino of Nations also served inexpensive dishes, and the servers took orders in any of 12 languages.

International Fare: 
But to adventurous diners, the biggest culinary thrills of the fest were found at the sit-down restaurants in the international pavilions. All of them served unusual delicacies made with imported ingredients, and many of them also offered wine, beer, and spirits that were hard to find in America. Here’s a breakdown of what was served in some of these restaurants.

The Japanese pavilion housed The Formosan Tea Room, which offered traditional Japanese tea service with rice cakes, as well as a few Chinese and American dishes. 

The Swiss pavilion had two very popular restaurants. One was an outdoor restaurant that served Swiss and American dishes served by waitresses in peasant garb. The other was The Chalet, which offered refined Swiss cuisine including the fried chicken, liver, and bacon dish known as brochettes Lucernoise.

The Swedish pavilion had a restaurant called The Three Crowns, which included a revolving smorgasbord. 

The British Buttery in the Great Britain pavilion provided guests with a wide range of dining options. On the low-end, fair patrons could order salads, sandwiches, and cheeses, while big spenders could feast on sirloin steaks, caviar canapes, and lamb chops. The restaurant served high tea in the afternoon and cocktails in the evening. 

The Tel Aviv Cafe at the Jewish pavilion offered a few dishes that were common to New York delicatessens at the time, like pickled herring, as well as more traditional Middle Eastern fare, like zucchini with eggs and potatoes. 

The French pavilion had one of the priciest and most popular restaurants: Le Restaurant Francais. In a dining room that overlooked the Lagoon of Nations, it served several opulent French dishes, including foie gras, crepes Suzette, and a duckling for two. Le Restaurant Francais was operated by Jean Drouant and his brother in law Louis Barraya, who both owned critically acclaimed Parisian restaurants. They brought over some of their best kitchen and dining room talent, including Maitre d’ Henri Soule.

The Cuban Village featured a replica of Sloppy Joe’s, which was a popular Havana tavern of the time.

The Brazilian pavilion served coffee and dishes like chicken broth with rice and fish cooked in palm oil.

The Romanian pavilion had a fine-dining style restaurant called the Romanian House that offered an extensive wine list as well as caviar shipped by plane.

The Italian pavilion had a restaurant that paired famous dishes with wines from the regions where the recipes originated. A white truffle fonduta, for example, was served with Barolo.

The Finnish Pavilion had a restaurant that served reindeer steak, salmon casserole, and rolled beef with vegetables.

The Turkish pavilion featured a reproduction of a typical Turkish bar and restaurant. Guests could enjoy shish kebabs, stuffed mussels, and raki, an anise-flavored apéritif. The backside of the menu featured blurbs of famous Turkish folk tales.  

The Belgium pavilion had a large outdoor cafe area overlooking the Lagoon of Nations. It served chicken au Champagne (fried chicken pieces in butter sauce), as well as Chateaubriand. During its second year, the restaurant was run by Andre Pagani, of the famed Carlton Restaurant in Brussels.

The Soviet pavilion featured a ritzy dining room with a menu that included shashlik, borscht, and several types of vodka. 

The restaurant in the Polish pavilion offered guests cold fruit soup, calf brains a ala Polonaise, babka, zakaski, and honey wine. 

And Heineken hosted the Zuider Zee, a beer garden that served the food of the Netherlands.

A handful of journalists wrote that the food was too expensive. After reading this, the commissioner of the World’s Fair conducted a survey of the restaurants in the foreign zone, and estimated that full meals at these establishments cost about 43 cents on average, which was a standard price for a sit-down meal at a moderately priced Manhattan restaurant.

Menus from the World’s Fair:

After the Fair: 


The World’s Fair introduced diners to many delicacies and styles of cuisine that were hard to find in New York, at the time. But the event also changed the New York dining scene in a different way: after the fair ended its two season run, some of the most popular restaurants made the jump from Queens to Manhattan, establishing brick and mortar restaurants that continued to offer the same food, served by the same people that traveled to New York for the fair. The restaurants from the Belgium, Swedish, and Swiss pavilions all opened outposts in Manhattan, as did Chicago’s Toffenetti restaurant, which set up shop in a massive space in Times Square. 

The staff of Le Restaurant Francais moved to a space on East 55th Street, and reopened the restaurant as Le Pavillon. With its doting proprietors, stylish dining room, dynamite food, and celebrity clientele, Le Pavillon was an instant hit.

(Source: ny.eater.com)

Union Square Café

Location: 21 East 16th Street (Between Union Square West and 5th Ave.)

6^th Floor Soho House

Location: 29-35 Ninth Avenue (Entrance is located on Ninth Avenue between 13th and 14th Streets)

Café Gitane

2 Locations: At the Jane Hotel (113 Jane Street) & 242 Mott Street 

 Jack’s Wife Freda

Location: 224 Lafayette Street 

Bar @ Balthazar

Location: 80 Spring Street (Between Broadway & Crosby)

Strip House Bar

Location: 13 East 12th Street

Bar @ Cask

Location: 167 East 33^rd Street (Between 3^rd & Lexington)

Cookshop

Location: 156 10^th Avenue (At 20^th Street)

Bar @ Five Points

Location: 31 Great Jones Street

Bar @ Lexington Brass

Location: 517 Lexington Avenue

His company has worked with private equity firms like LaSalle Hotel Properties and has been involved with such hotel chains as Wyndham Hotels and Resorts, Marriott Hotels & Resorts and the Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts. He also played a role in the launch of Cain Luxe Nightclub, which closed in 2010, and then again with owner Jamie Mulholland with the opening GoldBar.

“I was handling all of their real estate transactions, and that’s how we ended up collaboratively, collectively buying Surf Lodge together,” he said.

In its previous incarnation, Surf Lodge was a “dysfunctional” hotel that featured an after-hours lushing club. After he and his team of partners spent $5 million for the property, they spent eight weeks renovating the place (under the design of Robert McKinley, another partner of Kamali’s in the design). He brought on Sam Talbot, a semifinalist in the second season of Bravo’s Top Chef. The concept proved successful, despite a few minor municipal headaches (it racked up 700 pending code violations throughout its young career).

The Business was sold in April to Michael Walrath, a tech entrepreneur.

“I think Surf Lodge did so much for my career and my business, and it parlayed into various other deals because of it,” Mr. Kamali said. He would not specify how much the property was sold for. The new ownership group went on to pay $100,000 to settle 100 violations.

“In certain instances, situations arise where you get an offer that seems incredibly enticing, and you decide at the end of the day that you would like to take the money off the table,” he said.

Mr. Kamali still has a presence in the East End: He partnered with W South Beach’s David Edelstein and Jackie Mansfield to buy and reposition the Capri Hotel, which now features a Nobu restaurant and a Cynthia Rowley shop. He also has a hand in Ruschmeyer’s, a “nautical sleepaway camp”- inspired hotel/restaurant concept in Montauk.

“Opportunity breeds opportunity. The moment you do one thing, everybody wants to talk to you,” he said. “As long as you can create value for them, they’ll keep coming back.”

(Source: commercialobserver.com)

To win her over, try the black-truffle tagliatelle.

Dropping upwards of $300 on a fancy restaurant date is the new best gift to please a partner, mark an anniversary or just get outof the dog house, according to a research report out yesterday and interviews with analysts.

The report, from the NPD Group, found visits to pricey eateries jumped a startling 6 percent this spring — after devastating back-to-back annual declines coming out of the recession.

The 6 percent gain in visits to upscale eateries was the best in nearly five years, NPD said.

One analyst pegged the jump on diners finding new reasons to eat out.

“While many still struggle financially, a lot of consumers are starting to use a night at a fine restaurant as a replacement for a more expensive reward,” said Jonathan Probber, a hospitality industry consultant and educator.

“It’s become the new gift for a special occasion,” he said.

Indeed, NPD reported that high-end restaurants have climbed out of the industry’s cellar to post the industry’s strongest increase in traffic this year. Fast-food traffic is up just 2 percent and casual dining spots experienceda decline of 2 percent.

“Fine dining is a definite bright spot,” said NPD restaurant industry analyst Bonnie Riggs.

“By itself, fine dining is viewed as a better gift than a night at the theater, and is helping its recovery,” Riggs said.

Americans spent $407 billion eating out the year ending March 31, said NPD, with 13 percent — or $53 billion — spent on upscale restaurant tabs.

The balmy winter and early spring also helped fill upscale restaurants, said Peter Saleh, senior restaurant industry analyst at Telsey Advisory Group.

“Fine dining is linked directly to jobs; when employment improves, so does the traffic,” he said. “It’s been that way for years.”

The fortunes of the high-end operators of restaurants like Le Bernardin and Asiate also have improved sharply.

(Source: nypost.com)

 A restaurant is only as good as its drinks. A solid cocktail can make all the difference in a customer’s experience in a restaurant, so check out these tips when creating your exclusive list that will woo your clientele:

Know your customer: Do you cater to a younger, laid-back crowd that will be more prone to following drink details and specials? Or to a more sophisticated crowd, that rate expensive liquors and exotic garnishes over price? Creating signature cocktails can be a way to entice new guests into your establishment, so keep in mind the market in which you are promoting your drinks.

Create something fresh and unique. Your signature drinks should be something you cannot find anywhere else, and something that essentially embodies the vibe of your establishment. One method of achieving this is by mixing alcohols that may not seem intuitive, such as blending a blackberry or other sweet vodka with a port wine for an interesting drink. Experimenting with infusions can be another way to make your drink unique—all you need are glass jars, vodka, and a selection of fruits, vegetables, herbs, candy or other interesting morsels that might add flavor. Simply add your ingredients to your jars of vodka, and wait a week or two.  

3.     Add perceived value. Guests want to feel as though they are getting their money’s worth and adding perceived value makes your product worthy of a higher price. Customers consider the production value of a drink, hence it should not be something they can simply make in their kitchen at home, rather they should watch in awe as the bartender creates their concoction. Make the details count with garnishes that will add style to the drink, and choose your glassware wisely (make sure it translates the drink you are serving it in). If guests believe that they can only find a drink of this kind at your bar, you have made the right impression. 

Make it memorable. You want your guests to have a memorable experience at your establishment, and the cocktail list is just the gateway. Choosing memorable drink names can give your customers a sense of curiosity about the drink before even tasting it. Ways of doing this are by putting a spin on a traditional drink name, like “Bloody Mary Jane,” or coming up with a completely nonsensical name to get people asking questions. Service is also key: Does your drink light on fire? Does it have some kind of special ice? Give the customer something to remember.

Furthermore, a signature cocktail menu can help with marketing the image of a restaurant, can entice new customers in, and keep frequent customers coming back. 

(Source: foodservicewarehouse.com)

The Surrey

Location: 20 East 76^th Street, New York, NY 10021 

 Hotel Costes

Location: 239 rue Saint honoré, 75001 Paris, France

Public

Location: 1301 North State Parkway, Chicago, IL 60610

Hotel Du Cap Eden Roc

Location: Boulevard JF Kennedy, 06601, Antibes Cedex, France

 Palazzino Grassi

Location: Sestriere San Marco 3247, 30124 Venice, Italy

Hoxton Hotel

Location: 81 Great Eastern Street, London, England

Hotel Fasano Rio de Janeiro

Location: Avenida Vieira Souto, 80, Rio de Janeiro, State of Rio de Janeiro 22420, Brazil

Mama Shelter

Location: 109 Rue de Bagnolet, 75020 Paris, France

 Playa VIK Jose Ignacio

Location: Los Cisnes y Los Horneros, Jose Ignacio 20402, Uruguay

 Four Seasons, Florence

Location: Borgo Pinti 99, 50121 Florence, Italy

Through the years, I’ve discovered that there are five traits that are essential to consider when evaluating a candidate as a new hire:

Passion: With recent shifts in food and beverage culture toward more casual settings, customers expect well-versed waitstaff wherever they go. An owner’s employees are his/her brand ambassadors. If their attitude doesn’t project what your concept intends to, you may want to look elsewhere.

Appearance: The appearance of a restaurant’s staff is just as important as its décor. We aren’t saying servers and bartenders have to be tall and beautiful, but your employee’s image should be aligned with that of the restaurant. Whether it be tattooed and bearded, or clean cut and uniformed, customers’ experience is undoubtedly influenced by those that serve them. 

Trust: While it may be tempting to hire someone attractive and knowledgeable on a whim, you should never be quick to judge. Follow up on references. It is important to build your brand with employees that you can trust when you are not looking.

Ambition: No longer can waiters and waitresses be immediately generalized as “aspiring” actresses and artists. Food and Beverage has become a career choice to many. Look for individuals who plan on growing within the company.  

Charm: At the end of the day, it is the intangibles that make for a great employee. An incorrect order or a cold appetizer could easily be forgiven by an employee that possesses innate charm. It’s important for your employees to be able to create a special bond with their customers. This draws for returning crowds.

(Source: monkeydish.com)

IF YOU HAVEN’T HAD A CHANCE TO CHECK OUT BRIGHTON, HERE IS WHAT YOU ARE MISSING!

                                             :: GO BURGER BY BLT RESTAURANTS ::

                                             :: FISH SHACK BY BLT RESTAURANTS ::

                                                                          :: BEFORE ::

                                                                          :: AFTER ::

                 EVENTI HOTEL :: 851 SIXTH AVENUE :: http://www.eventihotel.com/

The Future’s Looking Brighton!

While Fifth Avenue, Madison Avenue and Times Square still hold the mantle for the city’s most expensive retail rents, brokers are headed downtown because that’s where the deals are.

Indeed, the ever-popular Soho saw more retail leasing activity in the last year than any other neighborhood in Manhattan — by a long shot, according to an analysis byThe Real Deal.

Some of that activity has been fueled by ultra-luxury retailers, such as Tiffany & Co., French fashion house Chloé and designer Stella McCartney — all of which signed high-profile deals there in the last year.

“[Retailers] recognize that these are very different trading areas, and that they can duplicate their [flagships] and still do well in each one,” said Joanne Podell, executive vice president at Cushman & Wakefield. “You don’t come to New York and open a store and figure you will get all your customers on just Fifth Avenue or Broadway.”

Retail brokers say the move by luxury retailers to expand can be largely attributed to the boom in tourism that brought a record 50 million visitors to New York City last year.

To look more closely at the state of the Manhattan retail landscape, The Real Deal conducted an exclusive analysis of more than 900 new and renewal leases signed over the 12-month period ending on March 31 on properties south of 96th Street.

This survey builds on the first-ever ranking we published last year. At that time, we relied on firms to supply their total deal volume. This year we used data from the CoStar Group, TRD’s own database and deals provided by each firm.

The survey — which covered more than 3 million square feet of activity of brokered deals — ranked each firm by the amount of square feet of deals they transacted. In addition, it looked at which firms were busiest over the past year in the city’s most-active retail areas — on Madison Avenue, in Soho and on the Lower East Side.

The ranking found that the top five Manhattan firms overall were Newmark Grubb Knight Frank, Robert K. Futterman & Associates, Cushman & Wakefield, Winick Realty Group and the CBRE Group. (Some firms, including CBRE, Cushman and Ripco Real Estate, did not participate. In those cases, we relied on CoStar, our own database of deals and industry sources.)

In addition to hot areas, the ranking also revealed other areas where activity was remarkably slow. For example, on one 21-block stretch of Second Avenue south of 45th Street, there was just one brokered lease during the entire yearlong period.

Manhattan’s retail market is notoriously difficult to rank because of the lack of transparency — far fewer deals are reported to CoStar compared with office leasing deals or investment sales.

Yet, the retail marketplace has become an ever-more attractive and important source of revenue for brokerages that have been trying to diversify their income base since the recession. TRD estimated that over the past year, these nearly 900 deals generated potential commissions between $100 and $130 million.

And some brokers say the continued dark economic climate in Europe could even be good for Manhattan leasing.

“I expect the next 12 months to be very strong for retail in New York City,” said RKF owner Robert Futterman. “Tenants will continue to expand, and notably, foreign brands will continue looking to Manhattan as a retail haven where they can open stores that will add to companies’ sales projections in light of Europe’s unstable economy.”

Meanwhile, as TRD has reported, there are new retail players entering the Manhattan marketplace.

Massey Knakal Realty Services and Studley both started New York retail divisions for the first time last year. In addition, just last month Jones Lang LaSalle, a global commercial firm with virtually no retail presence locally, poached a four-person team from Newmark Knight Frank (now Newmark Grubb Knight Frank), one of the city’s top firms. That’s on the heels of the November departure by another top Newmark retail broker, Amira Yunis, to CBRE.

Hot or not?

The heart of Soho had a greater concentration of deals than any other area of Manhattan. There were 47 deals signed in the area between Lafayette and Sullivan streets, which has about 700 retail spaces, TRD’s survey found.

And new tenants unable to find space in the traditionally more-active storefronts closer to Houston Street have been inking deals south of Broome Street, said Christopher Owles, principal with Sinvin Real Estate. That desire to get a toehold in Soho, which sees heavy traffic from U.S. and international tourists, has expanded the prime Soho retail zone onto previously sleepy streets.

“That is what happens in a tight market — it effects great change at a rapid pace,” Owles said. The new activity has pushed up asking rents to about $300 per square foot from about $200 per foot, seen only two years ago on one stretch of Greene Street south of Broome, he said.

Meanwhile, on the Lower East Side, tenants including vegan beauty store Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics have poured into spaces on Orchard and Ludlow streets, between East Houston and Delancey streets. There were 25 new and renewal deals signed in a nine-block portion of the district, with reported asking rents between $100 and $150 per foot. About two years ago, that range would have been $60 to $80 per foot, said Sion Misrahi, CEO of Misrahi Realty, which is based on the Lower East Side.

But just as there were bursts of activity in Soho and the Lower East Side, there were also retail dead zones.

The longest such stretch was on Second Avenue from Kips Bay to Turtle Bay, a strip that saw just one reported deal, a Staples represented by SCG Retail (formerly Northwest Atlantic Real Estate Services) at 570 Second Avenue. The area of drought extended from 413 Second Avenue at 24th Street — where Newmark represented Falafel Kitchen in a 700-square-foot deal last July — to 825 Second Avenue, at 45th Street, where Winick represented Perfect Brows, which took 350 square feet in September.

Surprisingly, Midtown West — including the Times Square “bow tie” — had some sleepy retail stretches, too.

On Seventh Avenue from 38th to 55th streets, there were no transactions reported during the yearlong period. That was even as tenants inked a cluster of deals just to the west of Times Square, where Futterman represented the landlord at 229 West 43rd Street in a deal with the Heartland Group restaurant company, which took 15,670 square feet. But there were no deals at all in the heart of the neighborhood on Broadway.

“I think there was a lull in terms of showcase tenants,” Futterman said. Over the past few years, American Eagle, Aéropostale and others inked marquee deals. “That’s kind of died down, but I think it will heat up again.”

And in Lower Manhattan, tenants held off as well — perhaps as they waited for the 2015 completion of the 365,000-square-foot retail development at the World Trade Center complex, and the 200,000 square feet of rehabilitated space at the World Financial Center, set for delivery in late 2013.

Only 13 tenants — including Pret A Manger and Morton’s Steakhouse — signed deals south of Chambers Street and west of Broadway during the survey’s time frame. That was in an area almost twice as large as central Soho, which saw three times as many deals signed.

Even on the city’s priciest stretch, from 49th to 59th streets on Fifth Avenue, only four tenants signed brokered leases, although one was for $2,700 per square foot — a Manhattan record. That was cosmetics retailer M.A.C, represented by Futterman, which signed for the former Elizabeth Arden’s Red Door Spa ground-floor space at 689 Fifth Avenue.

Dominant brokerages

While a number of firms divvied up the deals in Soho, one brokerage dominated on the Lower East Side. Interestingly, the firm, Misrahi, isn’t a giant firm at the top of the overall retail ranking.

Indeed, the 18-year-old boutique firm, with just a handful of retail professionals, brokered 17 of the more than two dozen deals in the nine-block Lower East Side area.

Misrahi — the founder of the Lower East Side Business Improvement District — entered real estate after operating a multistore clothing business.

He said the strong leasing activity on Orchard and Ludlow streets was partly due to buildings changing hands and new hotels opening up.

“Stronger tenants are coming in [as a result],” he said.

Meanwhile, Owles said Sinvin, which is located in West Soho, was helped by its three-decade presence in that area. His firm was on 14 deals in Soho, among the 61 it did in Manhattan last year. He noted that the firm represented the landlord of 97 Greene Street, which landed Tiffany as a tenant, and re-signed tenants like Japanese clothing retailer A Bathing Ape, known as Bape, at 91 Greene Street.

“When tenants are looking for deals down here, we tend to know before others,” he said, in part because the firm represents so many area landlords. But he added, “We’ve never had a lock on the market. There is certainly competition.”

Manhattanwide, the most active firm, Newmark Grubb Knight Frank Retail, brokered 145 deals, totaling 560,017 square feet on both the landlord and tenant sides. The firm nabbed the top spot partly because it has strong landlord and tenant representation. Second-place finisher Futterman completed 144 deals amounting to 511,183 square feet, while Cushman brokered 73 deals totaling 498,446 square feet. A spokesman for the firm, which declined to provide its deals, said the company “doesn’t participate in stories [even mentioning] broker commissions.”

Winick had 126 deals, totaling 493,827 square feet. The firm got a big boost from Duane Reade, which signed 242,202 square feet worth of new and renewal deals.

Rounding out the top five was CBRE, which TRD was able to tally on 63 deals, totaling 303,888 square feet. However, its numbers are likely undercounted because there was no clear way to gauge its deals without its participation.

Several of the city’s large firms concentrate — or, in some cases, avoid — certain neighborhoods. For example, Cushman focuses on a region near its headquarters in midtown — from Third to Seventh avenues and from 42nd to 60th streets. Approximately 26 of its 73 recorded deals were in that area, including the 66,000-square-foot renewal representing toy store FAO Schwarz, at 767 Fifth Avenue, the largest retail deal of the last 12 months. Meanwhile, some firms focused on a sector of retail rather than a geographic area.

James Famularo, senior executive managing director at Soho-based New York Commercial Realty Services, concentrated on food and beverage. Brokers at New York Commercial completed 58 deals with a total of 94,729 square feet.

“I kind of carve out a niche and focus on the restaurant spaces and anything to do with food and beverage.” Because of city and state laws, he said, doing deals for bars and cafés is “very complex.”

Dominant retailers

Duane Reade — which has dominated the retail pharmacy sector in Manhattan since it began to expand rapidly in the late 1990s — has not let up.

The drugstore chain — now owned by former rival Walgreens, but still represented by Winick — signed 25 deals for a total of 242,202 square feet in Manhattan south of 96th Street over the past year. That’s almost twice the activity of the next most-active store, Potbelly’s. Jeffrey Roseman’s team at Newmark represented the fast-food sandwich shop, which signed 13 deals for 41,266 square feet.

Roseman, an executive vice president at Newmark, said finding a good location for a tenant often requires keeping an eye out for underperforming retailers.

“If you look at trends, you see four or five [chains] expand rapidly, whether coffee or ice cream, and generally there is a shake out,” he said. “Those that do not survive become opportunities.”

Other active chains included cosmetics retailer L’Occitane, represented by Joe Sitt’s retail brokerage Thor High Street, which signed three leases; convenience store 7-Eleven, represented by Futterman, which signed at least four leases; and TD Bank, represented by Cushman, which signed at least four leases.

Luxury leaders

While Upper Fifth Avenue saw only four deals signed (among its roughly 60 storefronts) during the yearlong period, Madison Avenue was a different story. Activity there was much stronger with 20 deals signed between 57th and 72nd streets.

Prudential Douglas Elliman was the most active broker there, involved in 10 of those deals, including representing the landlord and tenant at 667 Madison Avenue. Clothing brand Paul & Shark took 3,100 square feet at the building. The rent reflected a return to a high watermark for the strip, at $1,217 per square foot.

Faith Hope Consolo, chairman of retail leasing, marketing and sales at Elliman, said pricing has been fluctuating wildly on that stretch, from the peak of the market at $1,200 per foot to a low of $600 per foot, and back again.

For her, and many other retail brokers, the Manhattan market is looking bright — despite looming credit troubles overseas.

“Europe should be much more stable this year,” Consolo said. “A recovering Europe — though very, very slowly — will be good for the U.S. as people continue to travel.”

Selecting a hotel that enhances your travel experience is a delicate art, much like choosing the right book to bring on vacation. Just as you wouldn’t want to read Anna Karenina on a hot beach in Florida, you wouldn’t want to rest your head in a gleaming high-rise in ancient Peru. Instead, why not opt for a 15th-century conquistador’s manor, set on the training grounds of sacred Incan warriors?

Often a hotel’s history is shorthand for the history of the destination itself. For those who appreciate the idea of property reincarnation, there are buildings all over the world with illustrious past lives—as castles, manors, private residences, industrial mills, monasteries and even prisons—that have since been reimagined as lodgings.

Hotels built to be hotels pack a different punch, hosting legendary guests that contribute to their storied legacies. Lesley M.M. Blume tapped the intrigue of the St. Regis New York in It Happened Here, her limited-edition libretto for Thornwillow Press. The slim volume contains big tales of mustachioed artist Salvador Dalí meeting the wild and wonderful Andy Warhol—and splattering him with paint—as well as style icon Diana Vreeland dancing on a table in a white Chanel dress. The Charlie Hotel, in West Hollywood, was originally built as a haven of bungalows for Charlie Chaplin and his contemporaries to get away from it all. (Today, the Hollywood set uses the refurbished property the same way.) And the story of Raffles, in Singapore, reads like an adventure novel—complete with tigers, escaped prisoners and the finest ballroom in the East.

Whether it’s a grand hotel gilded with gossip or a reconsidered building with a storied past, a historic property offers a mix of understanding and intrigue with an enticing sidecar—by staying there, you become part of its legend. Here are ten of our favorite hotels with history. These walls may not be able to talk, but we certainly can.

At the turn of the 20th century, guests at the Summer Palace awaited an audience with Empress Dowager Cixi inside an exquisite complex of pavilions. In 2008, Aman at Summer Palace picked up the tradition, inviting travelers to once again visit the UNESCO World Heritage site, as originally intended. By working with preservationists and artisans, Aman Resorts restored the original buildings and courtyards and seamlessly expanded the property to include 51 rooms and suites, a 15,000-square-foot spa and a 37-seat screening room. The seven-acre property’s tranquil atmosphere belies its accessibility to Beijing, which is just a 45-minute drive away. The resort also provides day excursions to the nearby Forbidden City, Great Wall of China and Temple of Heaven.Rooms, from $750; amanresorts.com.

Every evening, just before midnight, the enormous Portcullis at Amberley Castle is lowered to enclose the medieval property within its 60-foot protective wall. Built in 1100 by Henry I, the castle boasts an ownership that reads like the history of England itself. Passed from blue blood to blue blood, to the church and back to the royals, the castle landed with Elizabeth II, who sold it to a private owner in 1982. Purchased by Brownsword Hotels in 2011, it lives on as a Relais & Chateaux destination with 13 rooms and six suites. The luxury hotel also boasts an unusual event space near its entrance—a treehouse called Mistletoe Lodge built within the branches of a stand of poplars.  Rooms, from $500; amberleycastle.co.uk.

The gilded mailbox, vintage elevators and ornately tiled mosaic floor are a few hints that the 94-room Banke Hotel was once a turn-of-the-century bank. But the oversized lobby, with its imposing columns and ornate, circular windows, really seals the deal. Although refurbished in a dramatic palette of maroon and gold, the reservations desk still looks as though it could belong to a bank teller (perhaps it once did). Former executive offices have been recreated as guest rooms with alcove windows, contemporary furnishings and leather headboards. Convenient for train travelers, it’s in the Opera district, near Gare du Nord station. Rooms, from $350; derbyhotels.com.

In 1653, Knight of Malta Charles Martel built a mansion, known as the French Greathouse, on a bluff above the sea on the eastern end of St. Croix to protect against pirates. In the following years, the property became a sugar mill, a cotton plantation and a cattle farm. In 1947, it opened as the island’s first hotel run by a local family. In the 1940s, a trip to The Buccaneer meant a two-day sail—and upon arrival, “continentals” were expected to chip in by planning meals, raking the beach and mixing their own drinks. Today, the demands are far less considerable, but guests can still sip the cocktails that resulted from those boozy beachside experiments: the Raising Cane, the Caribbean Sunset and the Jump-Up-and-Kiss-Me. Rooms, from $259; thebuccaneer.com.

In 1924, the Ruth Gordon family built Charlie Chaplin a set of private bungalows as a countryside escape. In 2008, the property opened as The Charlie in what’s now West Hollywood. Although no one knows for sure which old Hollywood stars absconded to the hideaway, hotelier Menachem Treivush made the most of the rumors by naming many of the 14 English cottages after whispered guests: Marilyn (Monroe), Gloria (Swanson) and Marlene (Dietrich) included. Still, the big draw is the duplex named Charlie, which retains a touch of the Little Tramp: Canes decorate the living-room wall, and anyone taller than five-foot-five will need to duck through the original door, which the diminutive star is said to have had custom built so that guests would have to bow to enter. Rooms, from $400; thecharliehotel.com.

Spain’s King Phillip IV commissioned the Monastery of Our Lady Carmen of San Jose in 1646 as a home for Carmelite nuns. It remained as such until the Archbishop of San Juan shuttered it in 1903. Abandoned, the building fell into disrepair, becoming a dance hall, a retail store and, eventually, a flophouse, until the American industrialization of Puerto Rico began. Under Operation Bootstrap, an heir to the Woolworth fortune endeavored to restore the convent as a hotel. It opened in 1962 and continues to be a boutique alternative for those wishing to avoid spring-breakers. Perfectly located in Old San Juan, the property’s 58 rooms feature restored Andalusian tile floors and Colonial furnishings—and an expected dose of religious iconography. Rooms, from $220; elconvento.com.

Ayvali village, a small farming community a short 15-minute drive from Urugup, Turkey, is the setting for this former Byzantine monastic retreat turned cave hotel. Although few specifics are known about the monks who chiseled the property out of the landscape more than 1,000 years ago, the original frescos in the hotel’s adjoining chapel are a window to the past. Today the collection of seven houses offers 30 rooms (the prettiest have vaulted ceilings, although somewhat uninspired decor). Remarkably, the hotel stays temperate year-round, due to the natural heating and cooling properties of the volcanic rock. Rooms, from $215;gamirasu.com.

The massive wooden door of 11-suite Inkaterra La Casona is always kept shut, as a nod to the luxury hotel’s history as a private manor. But with the softest knock, the door swings open, transporting modern-day guests back to the 15th century. Those were the days when the grand courtyard–centered hotel, with its elegant antique furnishings, wood-burning fireplaces and wide stone walkways, was home to conquistadors don Diego de Almagro (the European discoverer of Peru) and don Juan Alvarez de Maldonado (conqueror of the Amazon). “El Libertador” Simon Bolivar (Bolivia’s namesake) moved in in 1825, after his final victory in the Peruvian War of Independence. Digging back further, the property was once occupied by an even more ancient group of brave men: the Warakos Academy, a training school for elite Incan warriors, which also stood here approximately 600 years ago.Rooms, from $380;inkaterra.com.

What do you name a hotel set in the once-infamous Charles Street Jail? The Liberty, of course! Built in 1851 the Boston granite-style prison housed incarcerated suffragists, WWII captives from Unterseeboot 234 and Malcolm X before closing, due to overcrowding in 1990. After a $150-million refurbishment that restored the prison’s breathtaking atrium, intriguing catwalks and arched windows (once said to yield light “four times as great as that in any prison yet constructed”), The Liberty opened in 2007 as a 300-room luxury property. The hotel’s bars and restaurants—with names like Clink, The Yard and Alibi—wink to the past (the latter is located in the former drunk tank). Rooms, from $299;libertyhotel.com.

Named for the founder of Singapore, Sir Stamford Raffles, this now-famous property opened as a ten-room hotel in 1887. It quickly became the site for all manner of glamorous intrigue: visits by author-adventurers Joseph Conrad and Rudyard Kipling; the invention of the Singapore Sling in the genteel bar of the landmark building built in 1899; the shooting of Singapore’s last tiger in 1902. During WWII, the hotel functioned as a transitional facility for the military by housing prisoners of war. The 125-year-old property was declared a national monument in 1987, and after a considerable refurbishment in the 1990s, continues to encapsulate old-world elegance in its 103 suites. Rooms, from $690; raffles.com.

(Source:Departures.com)

                            Value offerings, creative drinks bring consumers out

According to Chicago-based Technomic Inc., overall consumer expenditures on alcohol away from the home will increase 2.4 percent this year. The restaurant industry also is experiencing positive growth, reports the National Restaurant Association (NRA), Washington, D.C. Total restaurant industry sales are expected to reach a record high of $632 billion this year, which is a 3.5 percent increase compared to 2011, the NRA says. In fact, the Beer Institute, Washington, D.C., reports that beer sales in restaurants rose more than 9 percent in 2011, totaling about $23.6 billion in sales. Restaurants represented the largest share of on-premise sales last year, encompassing nearly 24 percent of total beer sales, according to Beer Institute statistics.

Technomic is most optimistic about hotels, forecasting the segment to grow approximately 5.4 percent this year; it expects alcohol sales within hotels to be slightly higher, says David Henkes, vice president of the company. Fine dining and casual dining both will grow approximately 3 percent this year; however, opportunities also are available in limited-service and fast-casual restaurants, he says. In 2010, 25 limited-service chains out of the Top 500 chains served alcohol, Henkes notes. Chains including Starbucks, White Castle, Sonic and Burger King serve alcohol in select locations, which might prove to be a bigger trend moving forward, he says.

The bar and nightclub segment, however, grew only 1.7 percent in 2011, Henkes said in a statement. However, a Technomic survey of the Top 100 bars and nightclubs in the country revealed that 70 percent of venue operators on the list experienced revenue growth in 2011, with nearly half reporting increases exceeding 10 percent.

“Although the economy and the industry did show signs of recovery last year, these venues obviously excelled at concept innovation and operational execution, as well as promotion, which enabled them to experience such exceptional growth,” Henkes said in a statement.

Overall, volume in the on-premise segment has dramatically declined in the last two to three years, according to Henkes. Beer, wine and spirits have declined approx-imately 3.1 percent, 4.7 percent and 2.2 percent, respectively, he says. The channel is starting to come back, experiencing slight growth in 2011. High-end restaurants, bars and nightclubs continue to perform well, he says.

Prior to the recession, on-premise was growing about five times faster than off-premise, says Mike Ginley, partner at NextLevel Marketing LLC, Westport, Conn. In 2008 and 2009, consumers began tightening their belts by going out to eat less frequently. Now as the economy improves, consumers are going back to their old ways, in turn increasing growth in on-premise locations, he says.

However, through the recession one generation has not stopped going out: millennials. This younger demographic has more disposable income and going out is part of their lifestyle because many millennials do not have the home environment in which to entertain, Ginley explains. This created more of a challenge for restaurants than bars and nightclubs, he says.

Although the on-premise segment is not as successful as it used to be, it’s still important for beverage-makers, Technomic’s Henkes says.

“On-premise right now is about a quarter of all volume, so if you’re talking to suppliers it represents probably about 24 percent of their volume, but from a dollar perspective of what consumers spend, it’s pretty much 50/50,” he says. “We always try to play up to our supplier clients that on-premise is strategically important for brand building, for trial, for experimentation, and from a consumer perspective they’re spending just as much of their money on alcohol in the on-premise channel as they are at home.”

The price is right

Nevertheless, consumer confidence remains low, leading operators to provide promotional programs, value offerings and creative drinks to draw in customers.

Initially, operators used deep discounts to attract customers, NextLevel Marketing’s Ginley says. These kinds of discounting programs included meal offers — such as an appetizer to share, two entrees and a dessert to share for $19.99 — and extended into alcohol in the form of $1 draft beers and $2 margaritas, for example. But deep discounting cannot last forever, he says.

“What beverage is all about is really better ingredients make better-tasting drinks, and consumers are willing to pay more for them and trade up to them,” Ginley says. “If we got stuck in a promotional rut where everyone was conditioned to have $3 cocktails and $1 beers, it would probably not be a good development for the beverage alcohol industry.”

Fortunately, Ginley notes that operators have moved away from deep discounting and started offering higher quality drinks at an everyday value price — about a $5 price point — with trade-up opportunities. For instance, Outback Steakhouse offers a $3.50 Gold Coast Margarita; Ruby Tuesday has $5 everyday value cocktails, which are made with premium alcohols but can be upgraded to ultra-premium brands; and Bonefish Grill features $5 martinis during its happy hour, he says. Likewise, Maggiano’s Little Italy restaurant kicked off a happy hour program from 3 to 6 p.m. Mondays through Fridays featuring $3 draft beers, $5 wines by the glass and $6 premium cocktails. Happy hour has made a comeback as a result of the economic slowdown, Ginley says.

“I think the best practice is to do an early happy hour from, say, 4 to 6 p.m. before there’s a big line and a big wait for dinner to get people in a little earlier, and then a reverse happy hour, which is running it again after the dinner rush from, say, 9 or 10 p.m. until closing so you can drive a late night business,” he advises. “That’s one of the tricks that I’ve seen operators do is try to focus on the late night occasions.”

Although value pricing and promotions can help to get customers in the door, they are not the only keys to success.

“If you’re competing on price, you’ve already lost because the winning restaurant formula requires you to have some kind of differentiation, and if your only point of differentiation is price then you’re not really doing anything,” says Technomic’s Henkes.

On the menu

To gain and sustain customers, on-premise operators are offering specialty cocktails, wines and beers at a variety of price points.

“Mixologists have become more and more prevalent in our culture, and I think that people are very interested in drinking specialty cocktails,” says Steven Kamali, hospitality consultant at Steven Kamali Hospitality, New York City. “They’re interested in ordering something that’s new and different and something that they believe somebody’s been thoughtful about, takes time and effort developing.”

One of the most popular beverage trends in the on-premise segment is low-calorie drinks, analysts say. The number of low-calorie or “skinny” mentions on drink menus this year compared to last year has increased 533 percent, Henkes reports. Many operators offer their own versions of low-calorie Margaritas, mojitos, cosmopolitans, Long Island iced teas and more, says NextLevel Marketing’s Ginley.

“Half the beer consumed in the U.S. is light beer,” he says. “So I think the idea of better-for-you cocktails, low-calorie cocktails, is really something that’s here to stay. I could see in the future, five years down the road, skinny or light cocktails making potentially up to 25 percent of all the cocktails we consume and order.”

Similarly, many operators are launching retro cocktails made with fresh ingredients, Ginley adds. Fresh cocktails have the ability to outperform skinny cocktails because the nature of the ingredients likely means the drink is lower in calories and better for you, he says.

Bourbon and whiskey cocktails also are becoming more popular in on-premise locations, analysts say. Artisan, small-batch offerings of traditional whiskey continue to emerge. And similar to the popularity of unique flavors of vodka, bourbons and whiskeys are being developed with honey, cherry and other flavors.

“There’s no question that the premium brands are still really going to drive the category,” says Technomic’s Henkes. “That’s where the consumer interest tends to be and … that’s where the money and the spending tend to be.”

Despite unique new offerings, classic cocktails remain on top. According to the “Cheers On-Premise Barometer Handbook,” published by The Beverage Information Group, the Margarita remains the most popular mixed drink nationwide, although it’s decreasing slightly in share. Second place goes to the martini, followed by rum and Coke. Sangrias and mojitos also continue to grow in popularity due to the number of possible flavor combinations associated with the drinks, says NextLevel Marketing’s Ginley.

When it comes to wine, Moscato and Malbec varietals are on the rise, as well as wines by the glass, Ginley says. There used to be a standard wine pour for wines by the glass; however, operators now are offering many different sizes to increase value and experimentation for consumers. By ordering an 8- or 9-ounce glass of wine, the consumer gets value, but ordering a 2- to 4-ounce glass enables them to experiment with multiple wines, he explains. Tasting flights remain popular in on-premise accounts for wine, beer and even cocktails, experts explain.

According to a study by Napa Technology, Campbell, Calif., 85 percent of top wine sommeliers, buyers and retailers agree that consumers are demanding and ordering more wines by the glass than they were in previous years. Furthermore,

73 percent of study participants agree that high-end, rare or expensive wines by the glass are enticing consumers to purchase what they would otherwise not purchase by the bottle — and more of it. For instance, the Grand Hyatt New York City offers a 2007 Vosne Romanee Burgundy wine at $40 a glass, and The Strand House in Manhattan Beach, Calif., serves Flora Springs and Silver Oak Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon wines for $36 a glass.

Wine dispensers present the same opportunity, but without an attendant. For example, The Staples Center in Los Angeles offers a 2005 Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon via a wine dispenser for $65 for a 1-ounce taste, $155 for a half glass and $305 for a full glass. Likewise, Le Grand Comptoir in George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston serves Opus One and Joseph Phelps Insignia wines at $90 and $100 for a 5-ounce pour, respectively.

Another way operators can cater to customers is by taking the intimidation factor out of wine, Ginley says. In addition to listing the brand name, varietal and year of the wine, menus can present consumer-friendly information about the taste of the wine, he explains.

“Younger consumers are coming into wine earlier than ever and I think it’s because wine is sort of disarming itself and taking a little bit of the intimidation factor away from it,” Ginley says. “I think that’s a really, really good trend and I think it’s one of the reasons wine is growing so well.”

As consumers shift toward premium wines and spirits, they’re also shifting to higher quality beer. In addition to moving away from mass domestic beers and toward craft beer and imports, on-premise operators are shifting their focus toward draft, he says.

“The way I’ve always heard it is the way the brewmaster would intend the consumer to experience his or her beer is in a draft format, so what I’m seeing in on-premise is a shift toward draft,” Ginley says. “I see more focus on drafts on the menu and more listings of drafts on the menu. [I] have to think that draft is the brewmaster preferred way to experience beer, it’s the consumer preferred way to drink beer and the operators make more profit, so when you add all three together, there’s definitely a shift from bottles to draft in the on-premise segment.”

Last fall, Heineken USA, White Plains, N.Y., introduced Amstel Wheat Bier on draft in upscale bars and pubs in seven cities. The brand also hosted consumer sampling events in select locations as part of the imported brand extension’s launch. After being well-received by consumers and the media, the company decided to expand the beer’s distribution throughout 2012 and launch it in bottles this fall, Heineken USA says.

Optimistic outlook

The core of the beer category remains the premium light category, and volume continues to be flat to down slightly, Technomic’s Henkes says. Although consumers express excitement about craft beers and imports, as a category beer is still flat, he explains.

Wine, however, has increased in volume and dollar sales and will probably grow the fastest followed by spirits, he says. Overall, alcohol will grow at about 2.4 percent this year, which might fall flat after taking the inflation rate or cost of price increases into consideration, he adds.

“We’re not expecting great things in 2012, but we’ve flattened out,” Henkes says. “If we’re not at the bottom, we’re close to the bottom but coming up. We have a long way to climb to get back to where we were, but at least we’re going in the right direction.”

Value, innovative cocktails and drinking format will all play a role in attracting consumers to on-premise locations, analysts say. Although none of them expect significant growth this year, they don’t see alcohol performance going anywhere but up in the on-premise channel in the near future.

“I think spending will grow and I think that operators will become far more creative,” Kamali says. “Ingenuity is what’s going to drive people to various venues, and we can only hope that people get more creative.” BI

Retail sales might rise with the doubling of the clothing sales tax exemption.

Beginning, April 1st, purchases of clothing and footwear sold for less than $110 will be exempt from New York State’s four percent sales and use tax. This is double the previous exemption for items of up to $55.

The tax free offer applies to all relevant items purchased in person, over the internet, by phone or by mail.

Unfortunately, while shoppers will be free from the 4 percent tax, those making their purchase in Nassau and Suffolk counties will continue to pay the 4.625 percent local portion of the sales tax, the highest local sales tax percentage in the state.

New York City is one of the nine other counties statewide in eliminating both a state and local tax on clothing on shoes under $110 per item.

The sales tax exemption is expected to save consumers save approximately $210 million statewide, retailers hope that the sales will aid in retail sales.

The Retail Council of New York State, a trade association that represents state retailers, said promotion of the exemption could help clothing stores compete with neighboring states.

Melissa Googas, assistant director of government relations at the Retail Council said, “”The savings, we believe, would resonate better with customers because they wouldn’t be charged any portion of the sales tax, state or local, and retailers would not be forced to compete with the neighboring states who have better sales tax policies,

The garden state of New Jersey does not charge sales tax on clothing. Connecticut, charges 6.35 percent sales tax on the full price of clothing, with sales tax at 7 percent for individual purchases costing $1,000 or more for clothing and footwear.

Restaurant Outlook for 2012 is positive, aided by increase in volume of beer sales.

With the economy improving, more people are visiting their local restaurants and helping the economy grow.

The National Restaurant Association Restaurant Performance Index (RPI) a monthly composite index that tracks the health of and outlook for the U.S. restaurant industry continued to improve in January, slightly down from December. Despite the decline, January represented the third consecutive month stood above 100, which signifies expansion in the index of key industry indicators.  

Fifty-six percent of restaurant operators reported a same-store sales gain between January 2011 and January 2012, while only 26 percent reported a same-store sales decline.  

Forty-six percent of restaurant operators reported higher customer traffic levels between January 2011 and January 2012, while 30 percent reported a traffic decline. In December, 57 percent of operators reported higher customer traffic, while just 23 percent reported a traffic decline.

The Expectations Index, which measures restaurant operators’ six-month outlook for same-store sales, employees, capital expenditures and business conditions, stood at 102.1 in January - essentially unchanged from December’s level of 102.3. January marked the fifth consecutive month that the Expectations Index stood above 100, which represents an optimistic outlook among restaurant operators for business conditions in the months ahead.

Fifty-three percent expect to have higher sales in six months (compared to the same period in the previous year), up slightly from 51 percent who reported similarly last month. In comparison, only seven percent of operators expect their sales volume in six months to be lower than it was during the same period in the previous year.

Thirty-seven percent said they expect economic conditions to improve in six months, down slightly from 39 percent last month. Only 11 percent of operators said they expect economic conditions to worsen.

The Beer Institute released new data showing that the value of beer sales in restaurants rose more than 9 percent in 2011, totaling about $23.6 billion in sales, according to a report in FastCasual.com.  

With restaurants responsible for nearly 24 percent of total beer sales in 2011, they represented the largest share of on-premise sales last year. Beer retail sales in restaurants jumped from $21.6 billion in 2010 to nearly $23.6 billion in 2011.

“Restaurants are having an enormous impact in introducing the many great brands of beer to consumers,” said Joe McClain, president of the Beer Institute. “Restaurant patrons are trying new brands and styles on draft and bringing that new brand loyalty to off-premise retail channels. The boost in restaurant beer sales shows there is a beer for every palate.”

The boost in restaurant beer sales coincides with a period of growth in the restaurant industry. Overall, beer sales rose more than 2 percent in 2011, surpassing $98 billion in total retail sales. According to market research company Nielsen, the increase in sales revenue can be attributed to the high-end beer business. The sale of imports, crafts and above-premium beers sold off-premise was up nearly 3 percent.

The National Restaurant Association its Restaurant Industry Forecast in which it projects total industry sales of $631.8 billion for 2012, up 3.5 percent from 2011.

While the U.S. restaurant industry is expected to grow this year, operators remain challenged by food costs, building and maintaining sales volumes and the economy. The restaurant industry may also be challenged by the rapid increase in the cost of gasoline resulting in a change in consumer sentiment to eat out, coupled with higher food and operating costs.  

The NRA reports that in 2011, wholesale food prices were up 8 percent, the highest annual gain in more than 30 years. In 2012, the NRA expects prices to grow by 4 percent.  

Because of this continued inflation, the NRA predicts menu prices to increase 2.7 percent this year, compared to 2.4 percent last year. Commodities most affected by rising costs include:

• Flour, 22 percent
• Coffee, 18 percent
• Eggs, 17 percent
• Beef, 15 percent
• Butter, 13 percent
• Pork, 12 percent
• Sugar, 11 percent

NRA reports that the national restaurant count is approaching 1 million, with 970,000 current units open. Also, 48 percent of all food dollars are spent away from home, up from 25 percent in 1955.

Dawn Sweeney, president and CEO of the NRA, said, “As our nation slowly recovers from the economic downturn, restaurants continue to be a vital part of American lifestyles and our nation’s economy. Restaurant job growth is expected to outpace the overall economy for the 13th straight year, and it’s clear the restaurant industry is once again proving to be a significant economic stimulant and strong engine for job creation.”

The industry is expected to gain back all of the jobs lost during the recession early this year. The overall economy, however, isn’t expected to be back at pre-recession employment levels until 2014.

The NRA expects Full service restaurants will be up 2.9 percent from 2011, while the quick-service segment is expected to grow by 3.1 percent, generating $174 billion compared to $169 billion.

The fastest growing segments include military food service, at 6 percent, and retail host, such as grocery stores and convenience stores, at 5.9 percent.

The NRA expects 10,000 new eating and drinking establishments to open this year, bringing the industry total to 970,000 locations.

Another retail segment leaving the marketplace-the music industry

For the baby boomers, once upon a time there were records, the LP, the long playing vinyl. The LP was followed by the “45”, a seven inch record. Records were replaced by eight tracks and in 1983 the implementation of the compact disc, or CD. Retailers including Sam Goody, HMV, Tower Records Virgin Megastores and national chains were the beneficiary of these products selling them to the mass market.

The retail environment has changed and the music industry’s future is here. The CD’s are out and digital downloads of music are in. The digital download explosion has resulted in the loss of another prominent retail establishment.

According to Nielsen Co and Billboard’s “2011 Music Industry Report, digital music sales accounted for a greater percentage of purchases than physical sales. Consumers purchased 1.27 billion digital tracks last years, which accounted for 50.3% of all music sales. Digital track sales increased 8.5% in 2011, while physical sales decline 5%.

Last year, 112 digital songs sold more than 1 million downloads, the first time more than 100 digital songs surpassed the million download mark. Digital albums accounted for 31% of all album sales, up from 26% in 2010 and 5.5% in 2006.   

Retail REITs love the New York Marketplace

Real estate investment trusts especially companies who own and manage retail shopping centers from around the nation continue to seek investment opportunities in the tri state area.

Earlier this year, Regency Center, a national developer, owner and operator of grocery anchored and community shopping centers, acquired its first property in New York. The REIT with its co-investment partner First Washington Realty, Inc. acquired the 141,382 square foot Lake Grove Commons, located at 110-150 New Moriches Road in Lake Grove, New York for $72.5 million, or about $564 per square foot.

The grocery anchor shopping center built in 2008 developed by Blumenfeld Development Group is fully leased to six national tenants. It is anchored by Whole Foods, the retailer’s only location in Suffolk County, along with LA Fitness and PETCO.

The purchase of Lake Grove Commons is Regency’s first asset in New York State. The company also owns the 103,892 square foot Plaza Square center anchored by ShopRite, in Wayne, New Jersey.

It was only a few years ago when another national real estate investment trust entered in the New York marketplace. In October 2009, Florida based Equity One purchased the 400,000 square foot Westbury Plaza at Old Country Road in Westbury New York. The REIT paid $103.7 million for the retail center anchored by Wal-Mart and Costco. The following month, it closed on the purchase of a 22 acre property, which previously served as the headquarters for Avis Rent a Car. The company is currently in the development of The Gallery at Westbury Plaza, a 330,000 square retail center which is scheduled to open in the fall of 2012.

Equity One entered in the New York City market in September 2010, when it purchased the 27,700 square foot retail condominium at 1175 Third Avenue between East 68th and East 69th Street. The entire space is occupied by Food Emporium on a triple net lease.

In May 2011, Equity One paid $55 million for a fee interest in a retail condominium located at 161 West 16th Street. The 56,870 square foot site on the east side of Seventh Avenue between West 16th and West 17th street is currently occupied by Loehmann’s. Prior to Loehmann’s tenancy, the space was occupied by the original Barneys New York store. 

TO WATCH REIT MARKETPLACE CLICK HERE