(Bloomberg) -- For 15 years, Locanda Verde has stuck to its cozy location on a quintessential Tribeca corner. The owners have withstood innumerable offers to expand while staying busy feeding regulars in the high-rent neighborhood, including David Solomon, chief executive officer of Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
But on Nov. 15, the landmark downtown restaurant will open a second location on the ground floors of 50 Hudson Yards. The building is the corporate headquarters for the investment firm BlackRock Inc.; Meta Platforms Inc. has 22 floors there as well.
Chef Andrew Carmellini, co-founder of NoHo Hospitality, which owns Locanda Verde, says his priority was for the restaurant not to feel like it’s in an office building—no small feat in a 78-story tower with 2.9 million square feet of office space.
De Niro’s Vision
On a tour of the new Locanda Verde with Carmellini earlier this fall, the space indeed manifests a neighborhood vibe, even on a busy 34th Street corner among the surrounding skyscrapers. When you walk inside, there’s a golden glow, with wood shutters covering the windows and dark burled mahogany wall panels upping the coziness factor; the shaded metal chandeliers aren’t too splashy. A long green marble bar with a dozen seats anchors space near the entrance. Surrounding it is a mix of banquettes and inlayed tables with chairs covered in handsome green-and-white-striped fabric or leather. An unassuming staircase leads up to more seating. It’s not an exact facsimile of the downtown Locanda but it feels familiar.
Carmellini says the corner location is key: It simultaneously helps make the spot feel more lively and like a destination. Another non-negotiable feature was outdoor seating, which will begin in the spring. It was a stipulation of a Locanda Verde partner: actor Robert De Niro. “When I first met Bob in 2008, there were only two things important to him: to have his dad’s art on the wall and that the restaurant spilled onto the street,” Carmellini says. “He wanted a good neighborhood feel to it.”
Bruce A. Beal Jr., president of Related Cos., a primary equity partner behind the $25 billion Hudson Yards development, says the restaurant also had to reflect the city. “As a developer we do our best to give people what they want. We kept hearing from tenants that we want more local restaurateurs who know and understand New Yorkers.” The original Locanda Verde is his local. “I live down in Tribeca, so I’ve been a frequent visitor for 15 years.”
Beal consulted with the tenants before signing up NoHo. “We’re in the service business—we don’t forget our customers,” he notes. “Food and beverage is a big part of that culture. We sat down with Rob [Goldstein, BlackRock’s chief operating officer] and went through the food options.” It wasn’t, Beal adds, an “‘If we build it they will come’ mentality.”
The overall goal, says Beal, was to open a “significant” dining spot. “It's a $10 million-plus investment to open a restaurant like this. And it's in the most valuable building that’s been built in the US, a $6 billion-plus building.”
“In Manhattan, restaurants say a lot about a neighborhood and say a lot about the eco system of a neighborhood,” says Goldstein. “Personally and professionally at BlackRock we are focused on building relationships. And when we think of the proverbial ‘let’s sketch it out on the back of a napkin,’ those napkins are at restaurants.” He too lives in Tribeca and frequents Locanda. Dining rooms like that are, he adds, “places where you break bread and conceive what’s possible.”
The Food, the Drinks
The menu at the Midtown Locanda Verde will be stocked with staples from the flagship, including the lamb meatball sliders and My Grandmother’s ravioli, stuffed with a combo of short rib, veal and pork and bathed in tomato sauce with a handful of grated Parmesan added. Carmellini will also introduce a crudo of live sea scallops with nduja, an Italian sausage. Among other new dishes are a green Caesar topped with anchovy crouton crumble; chitarra nero, noodles in the shape of guitar strings, here made black with squid ink and sauced with hot buttered crab and Calabrian chilies; and a lasagna verde stocked with a creamy, meaty ragu blanco and pink peppercorns. The prices will be the same as downtown, says the chef. The chef's signature roast garlic chicken for two, a favorite of BlackRock’s Goldstein, is $39 for one and $78 for two both uptown and downtown.
The 700-bottle wine list is rooted in Italy, including heavy hitters from Barolo and Barbaresco and labels from progressive producers in regions like Friuli and Sicily. Foreseeing the possibility of diners with big budgets, Josh Nadel, director of beverage, says there will be “a lot of verticality” (bottles from consecutive vintages) going back to the 1970s, from big-deal winemakers like Bruno Giacosa and Bartolo Mascarello. There will also be non-Italian bottles from places including Burgundy and Champagne: “Some categories transcend cuisine and are always in demand,” Nadel says.
Over in the cocktail department, Daryl Chan has designed a drinks program of tweaked classics with Italian accents. On the menu: a bittersweet cappelletti fizz aperitivo with gin, egg white and fennel pollen; the P&T, a seasonal gin and tonic with a splash of pear-vanilla liqueur; and the palomarita a tequila-based mash up of a paloma and margarita.
The 165-seat space was designed by Roman & Williams, who, along with including framed art from Robert De Niro Sr., have installed large earth-toned hand-painted murals. The seats are equally divided between upstairs and downstairs: There are 75 on the ground floor and 73 above, where the vibe is more intimate, and there’s a separate bar and a 28-person private dining room, as well as plenty of windows overlooking a park. (Given a choice, ask for an upstairs table.)
A Quarter-Billion Dollars in Restaurant Revenue
Despite the failures around the first launches of restaurants at Hudson Yards—Thomas Keller’s vaunted TAP Room was among the dining rooms that closed as a result of the pandemic—Carmellini thinks his team can re-create the demand they see downtown. “I 100% think we can achieve that here. It’s an interesting neighborhood. We have Bar Primi down the street, and it’s very busy always.”
Beal sees Locanda as a foundational part of the burgeoning and profitable food and drink scene at Hudson Yards. Coming in the next year are an outpost of Eataly at 20 Hudson Yards and dining spots from local star chef Gabriel Kreuther and a Los Tacos. There’s also talk about bringing in a notable New York pizza slice shop into the fold. “We have close to a quarter-billion dollars in revenue coming in from all our restaurants close to a year from now,” he says. “We’re a destination now.”
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