By Beth Landman 6/05/12 2:00pm

As Seen in SCENE

Julian Niccolini is ready to take on the downtown crowd

Julian Niccolini’s Next Season

Enter the Four Seasons restaurant on East 52nd Street, and you feel like you’ve stepped back in time. Soaring ceilings, chain metal curtains, a tapestry by Picasso and that dramatic pool haven’t evolved since the Mad Men era, when the space, designed by Philip Johnson and Mies van der Rohe, first awed diners.

There is one significant change, however. In place of the previous low-key owners, a puckish Julian Niccolini and his partner Alex von Bidder have overseen the grand restaurant since they purchased it with Edgar Bronfman in 1995. Tuscan born Niccolini has the gift of gab and breathes life into the elegant room as he works it masterfully, from table to table, speaking with irreverence and routinely playing pranks on his regulars. Now, after 17 years of honing his skill charming the Midtown power set, Read More

By Jasmine Lombardi 4/05/12 12:00pm

As Seen in SCENE

3 Photos

Morellet surrounded by guests inside his namesake diner. Paul Szynol

Seen in NY: Florent

In 1985—before McCartney, McQueen and Louboutin took hub, Florent Morellet took a risk on a neighborhood that was, at the time, laden with streetwalkers and meathackers. Six years after moving to New York, the ostentatious Frenchman took over R & L diner at 69 Ganesevoort Street but did little to its interior, keeping the original Read More