New York’s James Beard Design Nominees

When the James Beard Foundation Awards are announced in early June, New York is guaranteed to be a winner — at least in the Outstanding Restaurant Design category, where, for the second straight year, the nominees are all Manhattan-based establishments. Adour, chef Alain Ducasse’s new restaurant at the St. Regis, the Japanese restaurant Morimoto in the meatpacking district, and the Italian eatery Centovini in SoHo all got the nod from the James Beard Foundation, whose annual awards recognize chefs, restaurants, and food writing. The dominance of the city in this category is so emphatic, in fact, that the foundation, through a quirk in its nominating process — designs are eligible for the nomination for three years after they make their debut — has allowed Morimoto to be nominated in both 2007 and 2008. “We’ve found that the strongest restaurant designs over the years have come from New York or Los Angeles, and overwhelmingly New York,” the architect who chairs the committee that administers the design award, Belmont Freeman, said. “It’s very hard to build a restaurant in New York that’s cheap. There’s a tradition of investing money and design thought into restaurant buildups.”