When Restaurant Daniel first opened eleven years ago on East 65th Street, it was magnificent, and a welcome addition to the New York scene. To create his flagship restaurant, Daniel Boulud chose a designer who had never done a commercial space before, and who was known for creating luxurious residential interiors. The idea was a good one – an attempt to build a dining room that looked as inviting as the apartment of a very rich family. The effect, however, was charming but awkward.

Daniel Boulud’s success rests on his singular attention to detail, and his discipline. He is the most relentless of restaurateurs, and that is why his places are so pristine. So, in a few short years, he completely redesigned Restaurant Daniel, this time using the famous ADAM TIHANY, who is renowned for his commercial interiors, specifically those he has conceived for restaurants.

Last year Restaurant Daniel reopened after the re-design, and the results are worth the decade-long wait. The dining room feels substantial, and creamy, and hospitable. The lighting is particularly good, and everyone looks lovely, and happy. As with all of Tihany’s best designs, the space is a skillful blend of contemporary and classical. Good thing, too, because if you’re spending about $400 for dinner for two people, you (I guess I should say I) want the surroundings to match the food.

What kind of people go to Restaurant Daniel? Are there enough cave-dwellers (translation: people who live high above Fifth and Park Avenues with impeccable familial and financial provenance) to fill the hundred-plus seats every night? Probably not, not anymore, not these days. So the rest of us get a chance to experience the glories of fine dining at its best, at least on this side of the ocean.





Observed on a recent visit: Four businessmen, in bespoke suits and Hermès ties, distinguishable only by their different colors, having a preprandial glass of Dom Perignon in the lounge. When it’s time to go into the dining room, they rise, and two of the men pick up their cocktail glasses to transport them to the table. “Please, let us carry your glasses for you,” the hostess hurries to reassure. The composure of the elegant gentlemen was broken by this restaurant-dining faux pas.

A few burly men enter the restaurant, all sporting buzz-cuts, with shiny girls on their arms.  A night on the town. Some French people breeze through the revolving door, chatting and eager – friends of the chef, I am told.

Then comes the golden couple – striding into the restaurant as if it’s their regular canteen. They aren’t wearing coats; the car has just dropped them off, even though they live two blocks away. I know them, we kiss, they stroll into the dining room with other friends. He is a titan of a glamorous industry, and she is the blonde and beautiful (first and only) wife. She is wearing a short, straight skirt with burgundy sequins, a tight black moiré jacket with wide lapels and black strappy sandals with 4 1/2 inch heels, which are covered in burgundy sequins. She looks like a billion dollars, and like she belongs in Restaurant Daniel. Everyone else is playing dress up, and she is simply dressing up, showing everyone else how to do it.

An evening at Restaurant Daniel is more fun than a night at the opera – okay, it depends on the opera. Daniel makes his own kind of theater, on the plate, in the wine glasses, at the tables, through the service, in the air.

Before this recent visit, I’d forgotten how much I like this restaurant. I’m going back, soon and often. DANIEL is offering a combination of dessert and cocktails in the lounge in the front of the restaurant, for $25 after 9:30 p.m. I think my stomach, and my pocketbook, can tolerate that again and again.