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“The Monday Room”

Occasion:	Cuisine:	Area:	Cost:	Rating:
Night Out	New American	Soho	Moderate	Great

The folks at AvroKo—the cutting edge design and architecture firm made up of Kristina O’Neal, Greg Bradshaw, Adam Farmerie and William Harris—have designed some of the most visually arresting and exquisitely textured restaurants in New York City. They debuted with their own restaurant, Public—a stunning ode to libraries, government offices, and schools—and then went on to design places like Stanton Social (a small plate hot spot evoking the far away land of the Lower East Side’s tailors and haberdasheries), Sapa (a French-Vietnamese restaurant that captures the serenity of the hill towns of French Vietnam), and most recently, the European Union (a sexy rough around the edges gastro pub).

Their latest project—The Monday Room—is annexed to Public, built in a space they once used for exhibits and retail sales of housemade compotes and jams. The Monday Room is not really so much a restaurant as it is a supremely intimate den, a salon built as a place to unwind and chill out, as a respite from the fray. It is a cocoon of civility that will remove stress from you like layers of paint peeled away that you never even knew existed. It feels like a room you might find at some very old rich uncle’s manor house in England, but there’s an edge to the design that brings it all back to New York. Walls are covered in subway tiles, deep tufted leather banquettes can host as few as two or as many as eight, winged armchairs frame smaller tables for intimate dining, and soft lighting from cracked glass globes makes sure there’s not a furrow in anyone’s brow. There’s something about the room’s energy that encourages blood pressures to descend and all of life’s petty annoyances to vanish. But more than just a reprieve, The Monday Room has a purpose—and that, friends, is wine. Indeed, The Monday Room is sort of a wine lover’s bunker, with a list thoughtfully designed by wine steward Rubén Sanz Ramiro to include 60 wines offered by the flight, 1/2 glass, glass, half bottle, and bottle.

When Craig and I met our friends Deepa and Sanjit (actor and playwright friends of Craig’s from school) for dinner there last weekend, I explained the origin of the name. “The M ... [more, click below]

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Posted: February 26, 2007

Other restaurants in Soho :
+ Balthazar   + Savoy   + Blue Ribbon   + Lupa   + Public   + Kittichai   + Lure Fishbar   + Barmarche   + Porcupine-- CLOSED   + Ama   + La Esquina   + Jerry's- Closed Now   + The Tasting Room   + Papatzul   + Shorty's.32   + The Monday Room   + Ed's Lobster Bar   + Aurora   + Provence   + Tailor   + Hundred Acres   + Delicatessen, By Guest Reviewer Julie Besonen   + The Mott   + The Dutch   + Cherrywood, by Guest Reviewer Dara Pollak   

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