Every week we bring you the latest news in bar openings and upcoming weekend parties, and this is the day we do it. Up first: bar openings.
1. Greenwich Village: Now welcoming guests into its impeccably lovely and labyrinthine five-room pleasure suite of food, booze and meticulously chosen décor is the Hotel Griffou, brought to you by the masterminds behind the Waverly Inn, GoldBar and Pastis. There's an exposed-brick-and-chandelier wine vault; a rosy, cozy bar area; a stone-walled, dimpled-leather library; a red-walled and modernist studio filled with eclectic art and murals; and an elegantly wallpapered and upholstered salon (plus a terrace in there somewhere)—all of which serve Griffou's specialty $14 cocktails, like the Bloodhound & Fox (dry gin, sloe gin, apricot liqueur and lemon juice) and the Navy Grog (various rums, falernum, grenadine, pineapple and lime juices), as well as its classic-American menu, featuring dishes like stuffed lobster tails with brown butter veloute ($42) and the Griffou burger with melted gruyere ($17). Sort of reminds us of that Edgar Allan Poe story, "The Masque of the Red Death," where spoiled revelers move among multicolored opulent rooms, except at Griffou no one's dying of plague at the end. Presumably. Soft-open now, reservations accepted starting July 1. (21 W. Ninth St. near Fifth Ave., 646-448-4632)
2. East Village: The nicely appointed and laid-back Destination Bar & Grille opened this week, offering 10 beers on tap (like UFO Hefeweizen and the appropriate Destination lager), a handful of goofily named specialty cocktails (like the Slappledapolous Islands Rum Punch, $10) and some cringe-inducing "specialty" $3 Jell-O shots (Jell-O shots? really?) in their handsome and bright front bar as well as their handsome and dark back bar. A bar-foodish menu is in the works (pizza, sliders, etc.), but in the meantime take a seat in their slouchy sofas or at the gold-tin-plated bar while enjoying rock tunes on the jukebox and a Fuzzy Navel & Sour Patch Kid Jell-O shot. Or a beer. Go for the beer. Open now. (211 Avenue A at 13 St., 212-388-9844)
3. Brooklyn Heights: Back from the dead is Brooklyn Heights Wine Bar (formerly known as 50 Henry Wine Bar when it was run by a swindler who stole $25K from his customers' credit cards), which reopened last week under new ownership, thankfully. And those new owners are not swindlers! They're the good people who run the immediately neighboring Henry's End Restaurant and the food market Cranberry's, and under their steering the wine bar is serving dozens of wines by the glass and bottle, along with breakfast, lunch and dinner menus that're heavy on the small plates, crepes and panini. The bar's simple, woodsy and bright décor features (almost) floor-to-ceiling windows flooding the place with sunlight, wooden beams stretching across the ceiling and a handful of tables and bar stools for guests to sit and enjoy a glass of pinot grigio—or a plate of poppyseed waffles. Or a bowl of ravioli with fiddlehead fern pesto! Open now. (50 Henry St. at Cranberry St., no phone yet)
And now for your weekend party buzz...
