On Wednesday, September 9, two restaurants opened their doors on the same night. One was a 300-square-foot tasting-menu room on Park Avenue near East 97th Street. The other was a seafood wine bar on Third Avenue at East 91st Street. Neither one is on Madison Avenue, and neither sits in the Fifth-to-Park blocks most people picture when they hear "Carnegie Hill." The fall's newest food landed at the northern and eastern edges of the neighborhood. The middle is busy with a 40th anniversary and a community calendar that keeps coming back to the same short stretch of East 92nd Street.
That pattern makes this season easier to plan. The new places are a short walk toward the edges, and the occasions are close to the center.
The North Edge, in a Room Built for Catering
Creola is chef Lana Lagomarsini's first brick-and-mortar restaurant, at 1261 Park Avenue between East 97th and 98th Streets. Edible Manhattan reported that the space came to her through a friend from Les Dames d'Escoffier who was moving out of a turnkey catering room. The room is 300 square feet, "on the border of the Upper East Side and Harlem," and Lagomarsini had admired it for a long time.
The room is small, and that sets the whole format. Edible and Eater both describe 14 seats, while OpenTable lists 12. Dinner is a tasting menu at $125 per person, with an optional $65 wine pairing, according to Eater's August 25 preview. Creola's own site describes five courses that rotate with the season. Eater lists hours of 5 to 11 p.m., Wednesday through Saturday. The restaurant says it seats two services a night on those days. In early October, OpenTable showed the next open reservation as Wednesday, October 7. With seats this few, it makes sense to book ahead for a specific night.
The cooking draws on the pan-African and Black diaspora. Lagomarsini spent 15 years in kitchens including Gramercy Tavern, Restaurant Daniel, Momofuku and Blue Hill at Stone Barns, and most recently was executive chef at Francis Mallmann's Garzon in Uruguay. Viewers of Top Chef: Destination Canada may recognize a few dishes. One is a collard green "potlikker" consommé with trout and cornbread croutons roasted in the trout fat. Another is the "Patty en Crute," an oxtail pâté en croute with plantains that riffs on a Jamaican beef patty. Dessert is a passionfruit tiramisu.
The restaurant is named for her grandmother. Exposed brick runs along one wall and original decorative wallpaper along the other. A dark blue velvet banquette by the window, left behind by the previous tenant, gave her the starting point for the design. On opening day, Lagomarsini left that day's prep to her sous chef and kitchen team, and opening night went ahead as planned.
On the same corner, Carnegie Hill Neighbors volunteers planted daffodil bulbs in the CHN pocket park at East 97th Street and Park Avenue on October 3. The event was part of a City of Forest Day gathering with tree-care tips from the CHN Tree Pruning Team. Those bulbs will bloom next spring, a few steps from Creola's window.
The East Edge, From a Team Already on the Block
La Sardine opened the same night at 1614 Third Avenue at East 91st Street. Eater describes it as a wine bar focused on seafood. The menu runs from seafood towers and lobster rolls to brioche sliders with fried oysters or lobster, plus crab and jambon beignets. For guests who skip the raw bar, there are cheese and charcuterie platters and merguez meatballs.
The owners are not newcomers. La Sardine comes from the team behind Bar Vivant, which Eater notes is also in the neighborhood, and Alison, which has locations in East Harlem and the East Village. Both September openings came from people with ties close to the room they opened. Lagomarsini took over a space she already knew through a friend, and the La Sardine team expanded from a nearby address. Neither was an outside chain taking a storefront on the avenue.
The Middle Has Been Open Since 1986
Island sits at 1305 Madison Avenue near East 92nd Street, roughly halfway between those two openings. Brothers Jay and Kevin McLaughlin opened it in 1986, nine years after they started the clothing brand J.McLaughlin. Patch reported in September that the restaurant is marking its 40th anniversary through the fall with archival photos, classic dishes and cocktails, special programming, and stories from employees and customers. Patch did not give dates or a specific anniversary menu, so anyone hoping for a particular classic dish should ask at the host stand.
Island's staff tenure is unusual. More than 20 employees have worked there for at least 15 years, according to the restaurant. Patch reports that staff often know where regulars like to sit and what they drink, and that some have watched neighborhood children grow up and come back with families of their own.
The room has changed even as the staff has stayed. Jay McLaughlin now owns Island with his son Chris, who took over daily operations in 2017. Since then the menu has been updated and the operation modernized. The dining room got grasscloth walls, striped banquettes and new furniture, and a coastal-inspired outdoor dining area was added along Madison Avenue.
"You have to recognize what is charming, distinctive and part of the restaurant's DNA and leave it alone. But you also have to be willing to look honestly at what needs to evolve or be refreshed." Chris McLaughlin, to Patch
The same idea applies to the brownstone blocks around the restaurant. Keep what defines the place, and update the rest carefully.
East 92nd Street on Halloween
Island's own corner sits on the stretch of East 92nd Street between Fifth and Park Avenues that becomes Carnegie Hill Neighbors' annual Spooktacular on Saturday, October 31, from 4 to 5:30 p.m. It is free and needs no RSVP, with costumes, music, dancing, games, trick-or-treating and candy. The city's Trick-or-Streets list confirms the closure, Park to Fifth, organized by CHN, for the same hours.
The two blocks are run as different events. The Madison-to-Park block is the high-energy zone, with games, dancing and music. The Fifth-to-Madison block is a calmer, low-sensory "Chill Zone." A family that needs a quieter Halloween can enter from Fifth Avenue and never reach the louder end. With 90 minutes on the clock, it also helps to know which corner to arrive at.
The Rest of the Season, in Order
Most of the fall calendar is organized by Carnegie Hill Neighbors from its office at 1326 Madison Avenue. The 92nd Street Y's festival and a few Met events fill out the dates.
- Sunday, October 4, through January 31, 2027. Krasner and Pollock: Past Continuous opens today at The Met, with more than 120 works in a joint, career-spanning presentation.
- Thursday, October 8, 6 p.m. CHN volunteer mixer at 1326 Madison Avenue, for returning and new volunteers.
- Sunday, October 11, 1 to 4 p.m. A free family art afternoon at The Met, with no admission ticket required. Space is first come, first served.
- Thursday, October 15, and Tuesday, October 20, noon to 2 p.m. Guided open Mahjong play at the House of the Redeemer in the historic Fabbri Mansion, a new series from CHN, DSF Home and the House of the Redeemer. It is for players who already know American Mahjong, not an introductory lesson. Registration is required.
- Sunday, October 18, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. The 92nd Street Y's Lexington Avenue Festival, moved from its original date by the nor'easter. It covers 17 blocks from East 79th to East 96th Streets, and the avenue closes to traffic at the NYPD's discretion.
- Friday, October 30, noon to 2 p.m. A free virtual Rat Academy with the NYC Department of Health, sponsored by CHN. It is aimed at superintendents, building staff, homeowners and small businesses, and covers prevention methods and legal responsibilities.
- Saturday, October 31, 4 to 5:30 p.m. The Spooktacular on East 92nd Street.
- Saturday, November 14, 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. A free electronics and textiles recycling collection with LES Ecology Center. CHN has not yet posted the location.
- Tuesday, November 17, 7 p.m. Joe Rainey and Black Belt Eagle Scout in The Met's Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium.
- Thursday, November 19, 7 p.m. Friendsgiving Mahjong at the House of the Redeemer.
- Saturday, December 5. The Carnegie Hill Holiday Stroll, with seasonal treats, offers and family activities at local businesses. Details are still to come.
- Saturday, December 12, 7 p.m., and Sunday, December 13, 2 p.m. Rebirth Brass Band at The Met's Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium.
- Monday, December 14, 5 to 7 p.m. A second free virtual Rat Academy.
The Holiday Stroll is the date that brings the two halves of this story together. It is organized around local businesses, so it is the CHN event most likely to send people past both Island's anniversary room on Madison and the newer arrivals at the edges. A Saturday walk that starts at the Park Avenue pocket park and ends on Third Avenue at East 91st Street covers both September openings in one loop.
A brownstone's facade, stoop and iron need the same treatment as Island's dining room: keep what defines the house, and update the rest carefully. If you own a Carnegie Hill townhouse and are deciding what to preserve, what to refresh and when, Tom Wexler can walk through the house with you and put together a Tailor-Made Townhouse Plan.
