NYC developer banks on big-name restaurants to feed office building empire

SL Green honchos  — from CEO Marc Holliday on down — are more food-crazy than any other publicly traded company. They’ve made restaurants and food services a key component of their entire, 28.8 million-square-foot Manhattan office portfolio, the city’s largest.

While last week’s call was mainly about SL Green’s strong financial position, having leased more than 7.7  million square feet of office space since early 2020 and significantly reduced its debt, it also served up unreported, tasty bits about its investment in the city’s culinary scene.

Vornado’s and Brookfield’s office towers also have restaurants, but SL Green’s hunger for them goes beyond lending prestige to their buildings.

So enthusiastic are its top honchos for food and drink that executive vice president for retail Brett Herschenfeld boasted, “At 100 Park Avenue our coffee shop has the best iced matcha with low-fat oat milk south of 57th Street.”

Among the transcript’s revelations:

The SL Green-developed, Giorgio Armani-branded 760 Madison Ave., a super-luxury boutique condo building, will include Armani Ristorante, a high-end northern Italian place which has an outpost on Fifth Avenue in Midtown, as well as the designer’s new store.

The restaurant will open at the Deco-inspired project in time for Fashion Week in September 2024.

SL Green partnered with multi-Michelin-star holder Daniel Boulud to bring his talent to many of its addresses. Next November will see the launch of his open-flame grill restaurant Steak in a “grand space” at One Madison, SL Green’s new development where he’s creating other food venues  as well.

Boulud’s Dinex Group, Holliday noted, also runs the great modern-French and American Le Pavillon at One Vanderbilt and is handling a new cafe in the Lipstick Building on Third Avenue.

One Madison will also have an Omakase, Wagyu and Kobe Bar, which senior VP for hospitality Laura Vulaj  predicted will be “the most sought-after seats in New York City.”

An “iconic” rooftop bar and restaurant is coming to 245 Park Ave. for which SL Green is talking to “some of the greatest operators in the world” to run it.

The long-vacant former NHL Store and an adjacent Starbucks at 1185 Sixth Ave. at West 47th Street have been leased to Carnegie Diner for an expansion from its 57th Street/Seventh Avenue corner and also to a new Greek restaurant, Naxos.

Holliday and his team used the call to toot their horns for existing eateries in SL Green buildings  — three-Michelin-star Eleven Madison Park at Eleven Madison Ave., Fasano at 280 Park Ave.  Dos Caminos at 480 Lexington and burger joint P.J. Clarke’s at 919 Third Ave.

Chief investment officer Harrison Sitomer joked, “We own P.J. Clarke’s but that does not, for whatever reason, help me get a reservation.”