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Autumn Returns to Park Avenue
— Glowing Décore and New Menu Usher in Harvest Season —

New York, NY — (September 2011) After a fleeting, but lovely season as Park Avenue Summer, the restaurant on the Upper East Side of Manhattan has undergone a remarkable 48-hour transition to Park Avenue Autumn. The seasonal premise of the restaurant is evident in each aspect of its physical design, cuisine, and beverage program. Talented young chef Kevin Lasko created the autumn-inspired menu with contemporary classic dishes. The menu's focus evolved from showcasing summer's most vibrant flavors at their freshest, to taking autumn's harvest and featuring it with diverse techniques, like roasting and braising.

Chef Kevin Lasko created the autumn-inspired menu with contemporary classic dishes, such as Bluepoint Oysters with Cornbread-Chorizo Stuffing, Fig Carpaccio with Hoja Santa Goat Cheese, Duck Cassoulet a l'Orange, and Mother's Milk Stout-Braised Short Rib with Pumpkin Risotto. In addition to the main menu offerings, Lasko offers a special section of the menu dedicated to Burgundy truffles, comprised of dishes like Potato Gnocchi with Sweet Corn & Truffles and Pork Belly & Robiola Bossina with Granny Smith Apples & Burgundy Truffles.

Richard Leach, James Beard award winner, is executive pastry chef with a stable of autumn confections that delight for their concentrated flavors and stunning presentations. For Park Avenue Autumn, Leach's dessert selections include Sweet Potato Fritter & Pecan Pie with Maple-Bourbon Ice Cream and Crunchy Bacon, Goat Cheese and Fig Tart with Warm Crepe and Caramelized Honey Ice Cream, and Warm Ricotta Cheesecake with Yuzu-scented Apples.

The Park Avenue wine list consists of 300-plus selections, drawn from wine regions around the world. In the seasonal section sommelier Bryhiem Al-Tayar hand-picked a selection of wines from the cellar, grouped into such themes as "Hunting Season" and "Autumn Snapshots." In addition, he will continue to showcase fine wines made by esteemed winemakers. Each season will be toasted with custom blends of wine, made for the Park Avenue project by esteemed winemakers. Park Avenue Autumn will be feted with an apropos pinot noir, custom blended especially for the restaurant by Domaine Serene Winery of Oregon. Proprietors Grace and Ken Evenstad have been creating and setting the standard for premium Oregon Pinot Noir for over 20 years, and Park Avenue Autumn is a special blend of fine estate Pinot Noir from Domaine Serene's various vineyards.

The seasonal transformation of the beverage program is not limited to wines: each season three cocktail mixers are featured at the vodka/Champagne bar, developed by Richard Leach. For autumn, the infusions will be Pear-Rosemary, Apple Cider-Spice, and Tart Cranberry-Pineapple-Ginger. A generous offering of 25 wines by the glass incorporates many of the autumn-themed wines, as well as wines from the core wine list. In addition, there is a section devoted to seasonal beers to celebrate the Autumn festivals around the world.

Restaurateur Michael Stillman joins forces with award-winning design firm AvroKO (Public, Stanton Social) on the concept and all aspects of architecture, design, and graphics of the new restaurant. The physical design of Park Avenue reflects a space with a sense of discovery, rather than stereotypical physical manifestations of a "season." This led the design team in part to Captain James Cook's explorative travels as a loose design reference. They looked at the regions he had visited in each of his major expeditions as a way of framing each season. Autumn in particular channels the Pacific Northwest, envisioned through a classic, naturalist's lens, and then reinterpreted with a modernist's sensibilities. The surfaces and materials are woody and warm, leaning more heavily to nautical features. Hides are used as the backdrop to custom lathed lens installations, walnut veneer and mirror stripe the floor-to-ceiling wall panels, cocoa leather mesh is set into the window niches and over 250 copper clasped rope segments make-up a the central ceiling plane.

Just like crisp, refreshing Autumn in New York, Park Avenue Autumn is here for just a short time. In late November, the restaurant will close its doors to make way for Park Avenue Winter.

In order to facilitate the complete transformation of the restaurant four times a year with a minimum of downtime for the restaurant, AvroKO spent six months offsite, creating an elaborate architecture, which can be installed and easily converted with intricate panels to form the basis for each seasonal design. All physical components for the four Park Avenue projects will be born from one key necessity: transformability. To effectively change both the mood and the architectural details of the space, several systems of receptacles will be devised throughout the restaurant.

Custom steel wall frames surround the space and were built to accept differing seasonal panels. These panels will not only have unique materials for each season, ranging from wood, to porcelain, to mirror, but also have unique architectural details that will affect the style of the space overall.

The restaurant's phone number is 212-644-1900 and is open for lunch and dinner weekdays and brunch on weekends. The space is designed for 125 guests and has private dining rooms to accommodate 20 to 75. The Kitchen Table, located in a temperature-controlled room in the center of the kitchen, is available for private dining with a Chef's menu that highlights ingredients that are the essence of the season.

For more information on Park Avenue Autumn, please contact Allison Good at 646-277-2379