Restaurateurs behind Upper East Side cocktail bar ink 10-year lease
By Eddie Small
May 26, 2021
A new cocktail bar is coming to 1020 Lexington Ave. on the Upper East Side. The brothers behind Broome Street Hospitality are opening a new cocktail bar on the Upper East Side.
Tom and Anthony Martignetti have signed a 10-year lease for 1,200 square feet at 1020 Lexington Ave. between East 72nd and East 73rd streets. The asking rent was $200,000 per year, and they plan to open the restaurant during the fall.
Judson CRE’s Nicholas Judson represented the Martignetti brothers and landlord Rokhsar Realty in the deal. Rokhsar has owned the property since at least 1991, according to property records.
“With capacity restrictions now being lifted in the city, we believe we’re at an inflection point for the hospitality sector, which will lead to more leasing opportunities,” Judson said.
Bar and Books, a cigar bar, was the most recent tenant at 1020 Lexington Ave. The business also has a location in the West Village, along with two locations in Prague and one in Warsaw.
The Martignetti brothers also run the East Pole, an Upper East Side restaurant at 133 E. 65th St. They previously operated the restaurants Eastfields and East Pole Fish, but those closed during the pandemic.
The pandemic dealt a heavy blow to Manhattan’s retail sector, and restaurants in particular have gone through an extremely difficult year of strict rules and restrictions.
Optimism is growing in the sector, however, as the state lifts the last of its remaining pandemic-related restrictions. The British furniture retailer Timothy Oulton on Tuesday announced that it would open a roughly 7,200-square-foot flagship store at 901 Broadway in the Flatiron District during the summer, and a report from CBRE said the first quarter of the year, while bleak, might have represented the nadir for Manhattan retail.