New Year's resolutions

Olympia Dumbo, Queens crawl, meat delivery, The DeBruce, High Holidays tix, MORE

Sep 15, 2023

∙ Paid

REAL ESTATE • FOUND Development

Sailing away, Dumbo style

Who among us has not cast an eye on Olympia Dumbo’s elevated outdoor tennis court, flanking the entrance to the Brooklyn Bridge (above) and thought: I’d play a set there? Perhaps with the new owners of 24B, a 2617SF three-bedroom, which closed for $5.7M last month. Or with actor Michael B. Jordan, if he ever closes on PHB (the $17.5M unit for which he’s reportedly in contract). At the very least, we’ll bring a racquet to this Sunday’s open house at PHB, 4928SF, listed for $19.5M.

The elevated prices — some of Brooklyn’s highest — haven’t deterred buyers; the developer says Olympia has cleared 50% sold.

We like the building’s sail-shaped waterfront profile — designed by Hill West Architects — more than some, as well as the interiors, by Brooklyn’s Workstead. (Workstead is the ascendant design group behind the upscale craft aesthetic of the Wythe Hotel in Williamsburg, as well as the Rivertown Lodge, up in Hudson.)

Rising 33 stories and featuring two pools, a private garage, and expansive terraces, Olympia is not your grandfather's Dumbo. But that Dumbo sailed away long ago.

→ Olympia Dumbo • Developer: Fortis • Sales: Douglas Elliman Development Marketing with the Eklund Gomes Team and the Heyman Team at Sotheby’s.

NYC REAL ESTATE LINKS: Battery Park resiliency project taking shape • A real estate nightmare on lower Fifth Ave. • Gemma Gramercy tops out on East 23rd St. • How to sell faster in a slow NYC real estate market.

GOODS & SERVICES • The Nines

Meat, to your doorstep

Pat LaFrieda, third-generation butcher famous for top NYC restaurants’ burger blends
Flannery Beef, dry-aged beef (that actually tastes dry-aged)
Rugby Scott, humanely raised American wagyu, Black Angus beef off a Colorado ranch
Vermont Wagyu (above), well-marbled, full-blood wagyu; common and uncommon cuts
Rastelli’s, sustainably sourced proteins, organic, 100% grass-fed, pasture-raised
Genesee Valley Ranch, zero-waste, NorCal-raised, 100% grass-fed wagyu via Brasas at the Table
Winner Butcher (NY only), small-farm-focused from team behind acclaimed Brooklyn bakery
111 Beef Republic, true pasture-to-plate, Texas ranch-raised, grass-fed, marbled beef
Organic Prairie, yes, the milk brand, now with fairly priced, organic, hormone-free meats

Shipping across the US unless otherwise noted. Hit reply or email found@foundny.com with additions and subtractions.

RESTAURANTS • Syracuse > Manhattan Report

An ode to Saint Urban (coming soon to NYC)

Rising above the din of disappointment from a canceled Springsteen show was a lamentation of another kind last week in central New York: the closure of a truly great restaurant.

Saint Urban opened in Syracuse five years ago, on a quiet side street near the university. The owner, chef Jared Stafford-Hill, educated in the kitchens of NYC (Craft, Hearth, Union Pacific, to name three), grew up here. He saw a fine-dining gap in Syracuse, a city awash in Italian and wings. He opened a masterpiece.

I’ve eaten at Saint Urban maybe half a dozen times — most memorably, the night before lockdown, feasting on a seven-course paired tasting menu while Rome burned. Each visit was a wonder, the monthly menu built around a different wine region. The staff? Possibly beamed in from a rigorous culinary training program on another planet. Eric Ripert, whose son went to Syracuse, dined here whenever he came to visit.

Having incubated his jewel in Syracuse, chef Stafford-Hill announced last week that he was taking Saint Urban to New York City, where it will open in Manhattan perhaps as early as February. I cannot begrudge him the opportunity to compete with the best. But I was proud to live in a city that would support such a restaurant. If anyone else is looking for a chance to experiment, I know a place on Dell Street. –Aileen Gallagher

GETAWAYS • Upstate Intel

CATSKILLS: At The DeBruce (above) — the 19th-century, 12-room inn, where stays include breakfast and dinner — chef Eric Leveillee recently retooled the menu. The nine-course tasting pays tribute to six harvest seasons, weaving in esoteric ingredients like chaga, day lily tubers, and spruce tips. It’s one of the most sophisticated meals north of Manhattan.

Meanwhile, Foster Supply Hospitality, the group behind The DeBruce and a handful of other upstate boutiques, is planning an October debut for the earth-toned, Quaker-styled Hemlock Neversink. The 230-acre hideout — another all-inclusive — will feature a spa and Bittersweet, a plant-forward restaurant guided by Leveillee. –Kat Odell

→ The DeBruce (Catskills) • 982 Debruce Road, Livingston Manor, NY.
→ Hemlock Neversink (Catskills) • 7491 State Rte 55, Neversink, NY.

LITCHFIELD COUNTY: Newly opened Fern is the latest from chef Gianni Scappin, who also runs Cucina in Woodstock and Market Street in Rhinebeck. A special FOUND correspondent snapped the above exterior shot of the converted firehouse late last month. Inside, there’s an elegant bar and a wood-fired pizza oven. Send dining reports post-haste.
→ Fern (Litchfield) • 9 Sharon Rd., Lakeville, CT • Resy.

CATSKILLS: The farm dinner series at Callisto concludes next Saturday, with a harvest celebration in partnership with chef and artist Leah Guadagnoli. Callisto, a scenic farm and event space just north of the Mohonk Preserve, is the brainchild of Amalia Graziani, one of Hudson Valley’s youngest female developers and owner of Noor Property Group. The property features 63 acres of gardens, fields, forests, walking trails, and, soon, a new farmhouse residence. –Samantha Shankman
→ Fancy Feast x Callisto: A Summer's End Italian Harvest Feast (Catskills) • 2037 Lucas Turnpike High Falls, NY, Neversink, NY • Sat, 9/23, 5p • $162 per.

HUDSON VALLEY: The Una Pizza Napoletana team will be at Stissing House Monday, October 23, slinging “Pine Plains inspired pies.” Tix go on sale October 2 via Resy.

GETAWAYS LINKS: Bon App’s 24 best new restaurants in America • Delta’s just-announced new loyalty plan ‘stings’ some … leads others to give up • Gary Shteyngart does the Hudson Valley • Sean Brock’s next Nashville venture: a listening bar • Chris Bianco opening new trattoria at a Napa Valley getaway.

CULTURE & LEISURE • Sweet Seats

New year, new you

5784 High Holiday Main Services - Rosh Hashanah, 92d St. Y (Upper East Side), Sat @ 10a, $95 per (High Holidays bundle: $299 per)
Rosh Hashana Jazz Services, The Bitter End (Greenwich Village), Sat @ 10:30a, $149 per
A Musical Celebration of Rosh Hashanah, Brooklyn Bowl (Williamsburg), Sat @ 10a, Benefactor: $532 per (GA: $73 per)

CULTURE LINKS: Early raves for Perelman: ‘a spectacular work of public architecture’ … ‘dynamic, beautiful’ … ‘marble-clad cultural gem’ • New York City Ballet was in crisis. Then came a revival. • A mesmerizing sculpture comes to Central Park • Richard Ekstract, publishing legend with link to Warhol, dies at 92.

CULTURE & LEISURE • Friday Routine

Hoop dreams and NYC Queens

NATASHA PICKOWICZ, author, MORE THAN CAKE; chef, NEVER ENDING TASTE
Neighborhood you live in: Greenpoint

It’s Friday afternoon, how are you rolling into the weekend?
As a full-time freelancer, I never really have a quote-unquote weekend — no two days are the same, every day I’m working in some way. Workity work work. The American way. Every Friday or Saturday morning, I am doing a lap at the Union Square Greenmarket “for research.” I usually throw a hundred bucks at the market for personal eating and professional testing; the idea is to get one special thing from each place, like lettuce (Campo Rosso), tomatoes (Bodhitree), escarole (Lucky Dog), berries (Samascott), stone fruit (Toigo), edible flowers (Amoon).

Any restaurant plans this weekend?