The growing Big Night Restaurant Group (Marlowe, Park Tavern, The Cavalier) led by Anna Weinberg and husband James Nicholas is growing once more with Leo's Luxury Oyster Bar, named for their young son. As Inside Scoop has it, it's going to be a raw bar with a lounge in the space that was home to Wexler's the past six years until it shuttered in June and it's getting a Mad Men-inspired midcentury look via designers Ken Fulk and Jon de La Cruz.
The food menu will pared down compared to the group's other restaurants, as this place will be more bar-focused ("Food is so over," Weinberg joked with Eater), with an array of cocktails as well as champagne and wine emphasis on rosé. Chef Jennifer Puccio, who leads up the other three restaurants, will oversee a menu of oysters (grilled and raw), caviar, chowders, salads, crudos, a lobster roll, and other items.
FiDi oyster lovers will still have to wait a few months as the buildout happens, which will obviously involve the removal of Wexler's signature, whale-skeleton-like, undulating sculptural ceiling piece. The team is aiming to open before the end of the year, but we shall see.
