Chelsea Restaurant Bluebird Will Fly Into New York City Next Year

The restaurant group D&D London will take its restaurant brand Bluebird to Manhattan in the spring of 2018. The 10,400 sq ft space will open on the 3rd floor of the Time Warner Centre in Columbus Circle. The King’s Road site — a grade II-listed Art Deco former garage — was first opened as a restaurant called Bluebird Gastrodrome by Sir Terrence Conran in 1997; the space underwent a full refurbishment in 2016.

A statement issued this morning said that the international expansion for Bluebird is part of chairman and chief executive Des Gunewardena’s plans to “expand the Bluebird brand and further strengthen D&D’s overseas presence.” He said: “I am incredibly excited about us opening Bluebird in New York — we could not have picked a more prime location. The Time Warner Centre at Columbus Circle, with its views over Central Park is about as good as it gets for a Midtown Manhattan restaurant venue. We think that Bluebird encapsulates much of the buzz and glamour of the London restaurant scene today and will also bring to New York the quintessential style of London’s Chelsea. We hope New Yorkers like it!”

The Time Warner Centre is a retail, office and residential development at Columbus Circle in Midtown Manhattan, situated in the proximity of offices, theatres, hotels and has views over Central Park. The centre currently includes restaurants Masa and Thomas Keller’s Per Se, two of the country’s most expensive restaurants, as well as Keller’s Bouchon, a bakery.

Leading the American expansion is newly appointed D&D USA operations director Yannis Stanisiere (who oversaw operations at Biergarten LLC for The Spotted Pig and Ace Hotel New York City.) D&D have not yet announced the New York-based chef, who will be in charge of Bluebird’s kitchen in the States.

The spring 2018 launch of Bluebird Time Warner in New York will be followed by a second D&D London restaurant in the city's Hudson Yards development, which is scheduled to open in March 2019. Both Hudson Yards and The Time Warner Centre have been developed by Related Companies.

D&D London owns and operates 34 restaurants, principally in London but have venues in Leeds, Paris, New York and Tokyo, as well as the South Place Hotel in London.

The group will also launch Bluebird Café in March 2018 at west London’s White City development.