Trattoria Dell'Arte blends anatomy and gastronomy - New York restaurant

Nation's Restaurant News, March 13, 1989 by Milford Prewitt

Trattoria Dell'Arte blends anatomy and gastronomy

NEW YORK -- The nose might be too bland an organ for the art world to revere, but Trattoria Dell'Arte just might change that image.

The human proboscis, primarily the Italian variety, is being venerated in this new Italian restaurant whose first-time diners and passersby might mistake it for some kind of new wave art gallery.

Diagonally across the street from Carnegie Hall at 57th Street and Seventh Avenue, Trattoria Dell'Arte is hard to ignore, especially at night when the operators illuminate a huge, white nose in a second floor window.

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Adorning the walls of the two main dining rooms are enormous sculpted bas-reliefs of parts of the human anatomy. A single breast commands attention above a dining booth, while on another wall a giant pair of ivory lips against a forest-green wall captures diners' attention from other vantage points.

But it's the Italian nose that is exalted by Shelley Fireman, founder and owner of Trattoria Dell'Arte, and the restaurant's designer, Milton Glaser.

"We were going to call the restaurant II Nasa, but we chickened out," Fireman said, explaining that word, which means "the nose" in English, could have backfired.

Trattoria Dell'Arte is Fireman's second Italian restaurant situated near a world famous cultural institution. The prominent New York restaurateur's Fiorello is across the street from Lincoln Center at 64th Street and Broadway. A third Fireman unit, Fiorella, has a parallel location at 64th Street and Third Avenue on the East Side.

Fireman said the company had conservatively forecast Trattoria Dell'Arte's first-year volume at $5.5 million. But based on the past four months' receipts, the 275-seat restaurant is outperforming the projection by 40 percent. Its food-to-alcohol sales profile has met expectations, achieving a 75-percent-to-25 percent mix.

Customers are applauding both the art and the cuisine, Fireman said.

The chef, Claudio Scaduto, has arranged a menu rich in variety. Fireman said he did not want a "faddish Italian menu." Instead, the food list is strong in basic Italian meals with a slight northern Italian influence.

Entrees range from a low of $13 for a bucatini pasta dish to $25.50 for a charcoal-grilled double veal chop with sage sauce. In between are seven different pizzas priced between $10.50 and $13.25. The menu also includes sandwiches, a hamburger, and a generous sampling of antipasti.

In fact, Trattoria is merchandising its antipasti through an antipasti bar. Patterned after a sushi bar, the zinc-topped bar enables diners to sample dozens of cold and warm antipastos for about $9.

According to Fireman, despite the restaurant's elaborate decor and its proximity to Carnegie Hall, Trattoria wants to satisfy a broad spectrum of dining tastes and wallet sizes.

"We would like to attract a very eclectic audience," he said, "and that means satisfying all strata of New York. Carnegie Hall brings a touch of glamour, but we want all types, from blue jeans to tuxedos.

"We are not exclusively some thing, and I think our menu reflects that because you can eat at any price."

Fireman said the average lunch ticket is $21, and the average dinner ticket is $28.

Opened much later than planned, Trattoria Dell'Arte occupies 10,400 square feet, all of which was previously occupied by two restaurants -- The English Pub and The Chinese Pavillion.

While Fireman would only hint at the remodeling costs, saying they were "considerable," he noted that they could have been higher if the contractor, designer Glaser, architect Tim Higgins, and he himself had not worked closely together.

The alliance became critical when the past summer's heat caused a number of construction delays and setbacks.

"When something like that happens, the contractor and the landlord and the restaurateur have to get together for the survival of each other," Fireman said.

Fireman said the restaurant has a 40-year lease, but he declined to discuss terms.

Fireman is banking that the Italian nose amuses his diners as much as Glaser and himself.

Behind the cocktail bar and aligning a spacious second-floor private banquet room are paintings and portraits --both realistic and abstract -- of the noses of famous Italians. Created by well-known illustrators, the renowned nostrils include Casanova's, Joe DiMaggio's, Geraldine Ferraro's, Pinocchio's, Mussolini's, and more than two dozen others. Even the nose cone of an Alitalia jet is represented.

Fireman said all of the noses are original works of art representing a $100,000 investment.

A native New Yorker, Fireman said he has dreamt about establishing a restaurant in Trattoria Dell'Arte's neighborhood for 20 years. But in the interim between dream and reality, much has happened to the vicinity to make it more tempting than ever before, he said. The most striking development is the construction of several high-rise condominiums.

The close proximity to Carnegie Hall, however, is ripe with its own rewards, Fireman noted.

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Trattoria Dell'Arte blends anatomy and gastronomy - New York restaurant

Nation's Restaurant News, March 13, 1989 by Milford Prewitt

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