The latest in a spate of restaurant closings, Porter & Frye at the Hotel Ivy officially closed today.
The closing was rumored for a bit, and then confirmed for me by the hotel. There will still be in-room dining and food service to the lovely spa, but the restaurant is no more.
Of course the food set remembers the 2008 glory days of P&F when Steven Brown was running the kitchen, which included a saucy cadre of cooks like: Mike Brown and James Winberg of Travail, Doug Flicker of Piccolo, Landon Schoenefeld of HauteDish, Derik Moran of Dakota, Erik Anderson and Jamie Malone of the coming Brut, Josh Habiger formerly of Nashville's Catbird Seat, among many other talents who passed by those stoves. Pretty big impact for a short time.
But Brown was out as of 2009 and the place never quite caught the wind again, maybe because of the economy, maybe because of the location on the edge of town, maybe because of a series of management and ownership decisions. The hotel itself was sold early last year to a new group of investors, but remains a Starwood Luxury Collection property.
Word is there are plans to overhaul the whole thing, and that the restaurant portion is in negotiations with a local group to reinvent the space as something new, but no lease has been signed yet.
