Pop-up of the Summer
I Cavallini, Maine island dining, UES townhouse listings, Upstate Art Weekend, LES gallery crawl, a restaurant's world tour hits NYC, MORE
GETAWAYS • Maine
Island hopping
There’s no shortage of great options for restaurants in Portland, Maine, a city that continues to punch significantly above its weight when it comes to dining. But this summer, my best advice for friends coming into the state for vacation or camp pickup is to get on a boat. Why? Two of the best restaurants in the Portland area operate only in the summer on islands in the city’s harbor.
The first, Il Leone, is the atmospheric outdoor pizzeria of midwinter fever dreams. During the pandemic, owner and chef Ben Wexler-Waite convinced the local Lions Club to lease him a chunk of parkland overlooking the Peaks Island harbor. (Peaks has a year-round population of about a thousand people, which swells with summer people this time of year.) He set up a trailer, a serious pizza oven, a bunch of picnic tables, and opened for business.
When I revisited toward the end of last summer, I knew exactly what I’d come back for: the L’Estate pizza, named after the Italian word for summer. Made with Maine-grown heirloom cherry tomatoes and basil set atop gobs of mozzarella, shaved pecorino, and copious amounts of olive oil and cracked black pepper, the pizza’s crust comes perfectly blistered, the final result an absolute apotheosis of summer.
It’s one of about a dozen pizzas on offer at Il Leone, several of which (like L’Estate) rotate micro-seasonally on and off the menu (yesterday’s debut: this zucchini and squash blossom pie). There are also salads and gelato to be had. As of this send, it’s not quite heirloom tomato season in Maine, but I will assuredly be back on Peaks when it is.
Just around the corner (in a matter of speaking) is Great Diamond Island, with its year-round population of 106. There, in a renovated blacksmith shop that dates from when the U.S. Army operated a coastal defense fort on Great Diamond from 1873 to 1947, is Casco Bay’s other great island restaurant, Crown Jewel (above).
One might think that a flamingo-themed pink tropical oasis serving tiki drinks wouldn’t click in coastal Maine, and they’d be absolutely wrong. To oversee the menu this summer, owner Alex Wight brought in Nashville chef Joshua Kagenski (who’s worked under Charleston and Nashville chef Sean Brock, among others). Here, Kagenski is mostly offering playful takes on Maine seafood. When I returned for brunch last weekend, the food was sharper than it’s ever been, especially in dishes like mussel escabeche on toast with leeks and Meyer lemon, and a killer corn angelotti served with crab and tarragon. (The burger hits, too.)
As for the matter of getting to these spots, you’ve got three options. The simplest: Casco Bay Lines, the local ferry outfit that services both islands. The ride to Peaks takes about 15 minutes, and the one to Great Diamond 30 minutes, both from downtown Portland. There are also private water taxis from Portland (Fogg’s Water Taxi and SeaTow are tipped by those who know) as well as slips available for booking at on-island marinas close to each restaurant (tie-up fees $15-$75), should you happen to be bringing your own boat to the party. –Lockhart Steele
→ Il Leone (Peaks Island, ME) • 2 Garden Pl • Daily 1130a-8p • Walk-ins only.
→ Crown Jewel (Great Diamond Island, ME) • 255 Diamond Ave • Wed-Thu 3-10p, Fri 12-10p, Sat-Sun 11a-10p • Reserve.
GETAWAYS LINKS: One of the last water towers on the North Fork is for sale • On the Oyster Trail in Maine • Virgin Atlantic plans Starlink wifi, other upgrades, to debut next year • Amex’s worst Centurion Lounge? Philadelphia.
REAL ESTATE • First Mover
Three for-sale townhouses up and down the Upper East Side that came to market this week.
→ 164 E 91st St (Carnegie Hill) • 5BR/7BA, 5000 SF condo • Ask: $7.5M • classic layout with 1600 SF of outdoor space • Days on market: 1 (and earlier) • Monthly tax: $1984 • Agents: Daniella G. Schlisser, Justin J. Pak & Gigi Ozdemir, Brown Harris.
→ 208 E 62nd St (Lenox Hill) • 3BR/3.2BA, 4000 SF condo • Ask: $7.895M • 1870 house with 4 wood-burning FPs and air rights to 5th fl expansion • Days on market: 3 • Monthly tax: $6939 • Agents: Norhana Ariffin & Christopher Kromer, Brown Harris.
→ 506 E 87th St (Yorkville, above) • 5BR/5.1BA, 4014 SF condo • Ask: $8.975M • curb-cut garage and solarium • Days on market: 4 • Monthly tax: $2976 • Agents: Dexter Guerrieri, Nicole Kats & Emily Barham, Vandenberg.
REAL ESTATE LINKS: 24 NYC neighborhoods where housing prices have doubled in the past decade • Talking 1122 Madison Ave, Upper East Side’s priciest new development • High Line’s 10th Avenue Square closed for repairs through August.
CULTURE & LEISURE • Friday Routine
Site-specific
AMANDA RUSSO RUBMAN • artist and designer • AR Studio NY
Neighborhood you work in: Accord, NY
Neighborhood you live in: Marbletown, NY
It’s Tuesday morning. What’s the scene at your workplace?
Each day begins with fresh-roasted espresso (current roast: Tree House Brewing Company), followed by a walk with our English Bulldog, Oliver. It’s a brief distance to my studio, but long enough that it allows for decompression as I take a path that passes a pond through a field. Then, I open the oversized doors of our late 1800s horse barn where I work, to let the light in. I cherish this walk in the rain, extreme heat, and snow. It's peaceful and magical. Once inside, I typically stand in the center looking at current open projects to see what speaks to me, followed by a dance party to free my mind. Then, I dive in to create.
What’s on the agenda for today?
I’m in the final stages of a large-scale interactive installation, 'Untitled Narrative of Nature,' an attempt to satisfy a personal desire to express the beauty of hope. Like all of my installation work, it’s site-specific. I’m taking over the facade and full exterior of Weird Specialty in Tivoli, NY. The work is an expression of film, fashion, and sculpture set in the landscape of the Hudson Valley, intended as an invitation to invoke imagination through light, texture, and community. Today, I’ll work with half-inch wire to create one of the sculptures in a series. I will do all of this by hand and body force. The final shape will be formed on-site to allow for an understanding of the approach from all angles.
Any restaurant plans today, tonight, this weekend?
Food is one of my favorite layers of life. When you live in an area that can be tourist-driven, navigating weeknights requires effort. In various directions are Stissing House, Casa Susanna, and The Debruce, but in my immediate backyard, delicious go-tos include Upstate Taco, Inness, and Ollie's.
How about a little leisure or culture this week?
It's a beautiful thing to watch the Hudson Valley emerge in spring and thrive from summer into fall. The art scene in the Hudson Valley is spectacular, and July is for the arts. An annual curated favorite is Upstate Art Weekend, 07/17-21. The opening event for 'Untitled Narrative of Nature' is next Thursday, 07/18 (5-8p) at Weird Specialty.
What’s a recent big-ticket purchase you love?
My first form of expression starts in my closet, and there’s nothing like finding a vintage piece that defies all logic but for pure art. My most recent joyous pleasure is an archival Christian Dior silk multi-tier gown, at my first stop for all occasions, Three Turtle Doves in Woodstock.
What NYC store or service do you love to recommend?
Skincare is self-care, and one of the most important investments of both physical and mental health. I am grateful for the experts I am surrounded by, both in Kingston, Maria Vera, and in NYC, Dr. Amy Weschler.
Where are you donating your time or money?
I believe in the power of community and proudly reinvest right here at home, with a focus on education, art, and nature. Just recently, I had the pleasure of co-hosting a fundraiser at Friends and Neighbors for a local arts institution, Woodstock School of Art, which was established under FDR and still provides accessible workshops and classes with Masters on a picturesque historic property in Woodstock. I proudly serve on the board of Woodstock Artist Association and Museum.
CULTURE & LEISURE LINKS: Inside the new theater at Jacob’s Pillow and its ‘magic box’ • Jonathan Adler goes full pottery-nerd at The Museum of Arts and Design • The chair that charmed Paris.
GOODS & SERVICES • FOUND Galleries
Summer’s canvas on the LES
I returned to the Lower East Side to see some summer art shows. It’s not a hard and fast rule, but summer exhibitions tend to be group shows with loose themes that feature colorful, sellable work. Here’s what I liked walking around in the heatwave.
ESTEFANIA VÊLEZ RODRIGUEZ: Rodriguez uses pigment on canvas and linen, but to say that she’s just a painter does her a disservice. The works in this exhibition range in size from 14 x 11 in to 48 sq. in. The largest offers a lot of art for the price ($8800), but the small works with their mixed media including sand, glitter, and ceramic stand out. They look like candied confections at first but, on closer inspection, reveal layers of form and color that make them sculptural. At $1550 and $1750 for the smallest, these seem like obvious (and joyful) options.
→ Visit: Marc Straus (Lower East Side) • 299 Grand St • Tue-Sun 11a-6p, through 08/08
ANDREW LEVENTIS: This exhibition, Wildflowers, epitomizes summer shows: a small, straightforward series of floral paintings from various artists. Sometimes it’s nice just to enjoy the art for its own sake. Leventis’s two photorealist paintings — one of a vase reflected in an ornate mirror, the other a bird’s eye view of a memento mori bouquet past its freshest days — are easy to look at, but are far from simplistic. They can be enjoyed for their technique, but have more meaning just below the surface. $4500 for each 30 x 24 in. painting.
→ Visit: Massey Klein (Lower East Side) • 124 Forsyth St • Wed-Sat 12p-5p, through 08/02.
OLUSEYE: Nigerian-Canadian artist OLUSEYE’s addition to Hannah Traore’s Who? Me? exhibition is a weighty, canny approach to the theme of self-portraiture. A pair of handcuffs propped upright on a heavy concrete pedestal holds a photo in each of the manacle loops. Are they the artist’s parents, or descendants, or merely found photographs collected during travels? Regardless, the work is beautiful despite, or perhaps because of, the heaviness — literal and figurative — of the materials. The sculpture is $6850, and inclusive of its base. –Charlie Davidson
→ Visit: Hannah Traore (Lower East Side) • 150 Orchard St • Tue-Sat 11a-6p, through 07/26.
CULTURE & LEISURE • Automatic
The Lumineers • Citi Field (Flushing) • Fri @ 630p • sec 109, $116 per
Weird Al Yankovic • MSG (Midtown South) • Sat @ 8p • sec 107, $211 per (lowest avail, $37)
Patton Oswalt • Minetta Lane Theatre (Greenwich Village) • Sat @ 10p • orchestra, $82 per
RESTAURANTS • Intel
AND WE’RE OFF: Reservations are live for I Cavallini, new and much anticipated in Williamsburg from The Four Horsemen team. Reserve.
WORLD TOUR: Here are FOUND, while pop-ups are (unfortunately) disqualified from Restaurant of the Summer contention, we still believe in their potential to be deeply wonderful (albeit fleeting) affairs. This Sunday, and again Tuesday to Thursday, is one absolutely well worth your time, from the best restaurant in London that isn’t.