Last year, New York saw the opening of the new Javits pavilion and the massive New Meadowlands Stadium. While the next round of big projects—the Barclays Center and Atlantic Yards development, the restoration of Hudson River Park's Pier 57, and Madison Square Garden's overhaul among them—won't be complete for another few years, there are still plenty of important ventures on the horizon for 2011. As in 2010, hotels figure largely in the city's future, and Lincoln Center will open a new addition to its campus. Here's what to expect in the coming months:
1. Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center
Months ahead of the New York Film Festival, the Film Society of Lincoln Center will open its new facility opposite the Walter Reade Theater on West 65th Street. Set for a June debut, the Rockwell Group-designed center will offer two screening rooms (one with 91 seats, the other with 146), a public amphitheater, a café, and a reception space to the Upper West Side's performing arts campus.
2. Museum of the Moving Image
On January 15, this Astoria museum is expected to finally open the doors to its new home, an expanded site that at 97,700 square feet is almost double the size of the original museum. The renovation, a $67 million project designed by Leeser Architecture, includes the addition of a 267-seat theater, a 10,000-square-foot garden, a 71-seat screening room, and high-tech upgrades to allow video to be projected on surfaces throughout, turning the venue into a virtual environment of moving images.
3. Conrad New York
The neighborhood around the World Financial Center is growing, and on the site of what is currently the Embassy Suites New York, Hilton Worldwide will build the fifth U.S. location of the global hotel company's luxury brand and the first outpost in New York. Slated to open in the fourth quarter of 2011, the 463-room Conrad New York property will offer more than 17,000 square feet of meeting space, including a 6,000-square-foot grand ballroom with the capacity for more than 600 guests.
4. Unnamed Union Square Hospitality Group Restaurant
Anchoring the Conrad hotel's development will be three new eateries from Danny Meyer's Union Square Hospitality Group. In this downtown area, on North End Avenue, between Vesey and Murray streets, the restaurateur plans to open an as-yet-unnamed fine-dining restaurant, as well as a second location of Blue Smoke and an outpost of his wildly popular burger spot Shake Shack.
5. Mondrian New York
Delays pushed back the opening of the Morgan Hotel Group's much-buzzed-about Mondrian hotel; the SoHo property is now slated to open in February. Still on the books is Benjamin Noriega-Ortiz's design inspired by Jean Cocteau's 1946 film La Belle et la Bête, a seafood restaurant from former Top Chef contestant Sam Talbot, an indoor-outdoor bar, and meeting and event space.
6. Dream Downtown
Beside the ever-popular Maritime Hotel in west Chelsea, Vikram Chatwal's second New York location of his Dream Hotel brand is expected to open in the spring. Like its Midtown sibling, the Dream Downtown will be a boutique property, with 250 rooms, a full spa, a rooftop pool and lounge, and a private screening room and presentation lounge. Chef and neurologist Miguel Sánchez Romera is responsible for the restaurant and bar inside the hotel, which will serve his brand of "intellectual cuisine."
7. NoMad Hotel
GFI Development Company, the same developer behind the Ace Hotel, is expected to debut its boutique property in spring, in the area north of Madison Square Park. Designed to be one of the city’s first renovated hotels certified by the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, the NoMad is inside a 12-story French Renaissance-style building and will offer loftlike guest rooms and suites with high ceilings and French bohemian decor.
8. Nolitan
Slated to open in February, the Nolitan is another boutique popping up in a section of the city not yet crowded with hotels. The building is being designed by Grzywinski & Pons, the architecture firm behind the Hotel on Rivington, and Meyer Davis is responsible for the interiors. Although the venue will have just 55 rooms, it will offer J&S Food Hall, a 70-seat restaurant from Jimmy Bradley, and a rooftop lounge that will be available for private events.
9. Doubletree Financial District
Joining the Andaz Wall Street and the W Downtown in the financial district will be a new hotel suited for business groups and travelers. Slated to open early this year, the 399-room Doubletree will have high-speed wireless Internet access, work desks with ergonomic chairs in every room, a 24-hour business center, and a boardroom for meetings. An in-house eatery will be called Eightstone Restaurant & Bar.
10. The Leopard at des Artistes
George and Jenifer Lang's beloved Upper West Side eatery Café des Artistes closed in 2009 after 92 years in business, but last year, restaurateur Gianfranco Sorrentino secured a 15-year lease on the space and plans to restore and reopen the space by March. To be named the Leopard at des Artistes, the restaurant will retain the Howard Chandler Christy murals that made its predecessor famous and serve Southern Italian dishes.
