Two E. 60th St. Restaurants May Disappear; Developer Wants to Demolish Their Buildings

Two neighborhood restaurants, Philippe Chow and Il Mulino, could be facing the wrecking ball after a real estate developer filed plans to demolish their East 60th Street lots.

Extell Development Co. had already been planning to erect a new 37-story tower just next door at 655 Madison Ave., which is currently an out-of-use office building that they’ll also need to demolish first. Extell bought the lot for $160 million last October; its then-owner, Williams Equities, had already slated it for demolition just months before the sale.

Yet according to Department of Buildings filings first reported by Crain’s New York Business, they now plan on demolishing four adjoining properties that happen to contain the popular Chinese and Italian restaurants.

Philippe Chow is located at 33 E. 60th. Another, 35 E. 60th St., is a strictly residential building that reportedly has no occupants. The third, 37 E. 60th St., contains Il Mulino. The final address, 39 E. 60th St., is a mixed-use building that used to house a deli. The addresses that contain the restaurants currently have no residents living on their upper floors.

Our Town visited Philippe Chow on Thursday, March 6, and was told by staff that they had “no comment” on a pending demolition. A manager at Il Mulino, meanwhile, confirmed that the news had reached their staff: “Our new thing is that the secret is out.”

He further hinted that Il Mulino intended to stay in the neighborhood if the demolitions are approved by the city, saying that they would “definitely be moving close” to the current location. People had begun to speculate that something was up, the manager added, when the last remaining residents living in the conjoining buildings began to move out.

According to property records first reviewed by Crain’s, the four new addresses slated for demolition are still listed under the ownership of Solil Management, a subsidiary of the real estate empire founded by the late Sol Goldman. However, the demolition permit filings with the DOB that were reviewed by Our Town list Extell as the owner, suggesting that there could be a lag in updating city property records.

The 37-story tower that Extell plans to build at 655 Madison Ave. is officially set to encompass 162,000 square feet, which is slightly less than the 200,000-square-foot building that exists there now. It would contain 62 residential units, as well as office and retail space on the first six floors.

The pending demolition of the four conjoining addresses could feasibly enlarge that project significantly, if that is indeed Extell’s goal–they’ve given no official reason as to why they want to demolish the extra lots yet.

However, as of March 5, the DOB had issued objections to Extell’s latest filing seeking to get the demolition of 655 Madison underway. Extell previously received objections to a similar filing in January, indicating that they are facing some hurdles in their demolition submissions.

As of now, the building is swathed in preparatory scaffolding. It remains to be seen if the fresh demolition plans for the conjoining addresses will face similar roadblocks.

Extell is otherwise known for developing Central Park Tower, one of the super-tall and super-skinny skyscrapers that make up “Billionaire’s Row,” as well as the luxury Two Bridges skyscraper known as One Manhattan Square. They also just recently sold a 12,000-square-foot lot at 355 E. 86th St. to the developer Chess Builders, which plans on transforming it into much taller twin 22-story towers.