Roosevelt Islander Online: Watch Today’s Ribbon Cutting Ceremony Celebrating Opening Of Roosevelt Island Cornell Tech Graduate Hotel

Roosevelt Islander Online: Watch Today’s Ribbon Cutting Ceremony Celebrating Opening Of Roosevelt Island Cornell Tech Graduate Hotel

The Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel
on the Cornell Tech campus opened for business yesterday. 

This morning,
the Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel welcomed the Roosevelt Island community and
guests with a ribbon cutting ceremony to officially open the hotel.

The Ribbon cutting ceremony was hosted by Graduate Hotel General Manager Bill
Cutillo and speakers included:

 

The question everyone on Roosevelt Island is asking is when will the Rooftop
Bar/Restaurant and Ground Floor Restaurant open?

We still don’t have an exact opening date yet for either restaurant opening,
but I am told that the Ground Floor restaurant is expected to open in the next
2 weeks and the Rooftop Bar/Restaurant sometime in July.

We did learn from Mr. Abrou that the name of the Ground Floor Restaurant is:

Anything At All

and the name of the Rooftop Bar/Restaurant  is:

Panoroma.

Believe me, the name Panorama is right on target for the Rooftop
Bar/Restaurant. The NYC skyline and East River waterfront views seen from the Panorama’s rooftop are magnificent.
As reported yesterday:

… Last Friday, I toured the Graduate Hotel and it looks fantastic. The
ground floor will have an indoor restaurant with outdoor seating and a lobby
area that is welcoming the Roosevelt Island community to sit,relax, eat,
drink, chat and read.

The rooftop bar and restaurant is a site to behold. It reminded me of the
old Rainbow Room on top of Rockefeller Center. The views are
breathtaking….

… Here’s a peek today at the lobby area and ground floor restaurant….

Long time Roosevelt Island resident Ross Wollen was a “staycation” guest for
the first night at the Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel. Mr. Wollen reports:

We were delighted by the whole experience and look forward to when the
Graduate has its restaurants and rooftop lounge open.

Our Junior Suite had a very interesting view – eye level to the very close
Bridge traffic – not what we see from Rivercross. It must be said the
extended Lobby and even the rooms strongly resemble a Museum and Library
dedicated to Roosevelt Island and President Roosevelt, and alone are worth
a visit. Our room was very commodious and every Graduate staff member we met
was extremely gracious and helpful. The linens were wonderful.

I should add that our short trip to Granny Annie’s for dinner was excellent
too.

It was a wonderful trip wrapping up my Birthday Weekend.

The Twitterverse reported on today’s Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel ribbon
cutting ceremony.

The
Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel
adds:

Graduate Hotels®️ is excited to announce that Graduate Roosevelt Island opens
its doors on June 1, 2021. The 224-key, 18-story hotel opens as part of the
Graduate Hotels collection at the Cornell Tech campus on New York City’s
Roosevelt Island. Serving as the island’s first hotel, Graduate Roosevelt
Island marks the brand’s 29th property and New York City debut. Located at 22
North Loop Road, the hotel offers a scholastic retreat in the middle of the
East River with bright, modern spaces and breathtaking views of Manhattan,
Queens and beyond.
 
Created for travelers who seek
memory-making journeys, Graduate Hotels is a hand-crafted collection of hotels
that reside in dynamic university-anchored towns across the country and
expanding into the U.K. in summer 2021. Each property celebrates and
commemorates the optimistic energy of its community, while offering an
extended retreat to places that often play host to the best days of our
lives.
 
“We’re thrilled to make our debut in New York with the
first ever hotel on Roosevelt Island and proud to join the innovative Cornell
Tech campus,” said Ben Weprin, founder and CEO of Graduate Hotels. “Each of
our hotels are rooted in the communities they serve, and we took great care in
creating a highly customized hotel experience that honors the island’s rich
history and has an authentic connection to the Cornell Tech campus. Now more
than ever, there is a new appreciation for exploring what’s in your own
backyard and we look forward to welcoming locals and visitors looking to
experience New York from a fresh and unexpected vantage point.”
 
Positioned
at the entrance of the Cornell Tech campus, the hotel is architecturally
designed by internationally renowned design firm, Snøhetta, and New York
City-based hospitality-focused architecture firm, Stonehill Taylor, with
interior design from Graduate Hotels’ in-house team. The interior design of
the hotel blends Old School and New Age, taking inspiration from both the rich
history of Roosevelt Island and the future of technology that the Cornell Tech
campus embodies. The futuristic and functional meld to create a space that’s
bright, open and always interesting.
 
Upon entering, guests
are greeted with a custom 12-foot statement sculpture created by Hebru
Brantley that reinterprets his iconic Flyboy character and a neon Graduate
sign situated above the reception desk, which is a reimagined vintage
apothecary cabinet. Nods to the island’s storied history can be seen through
the corridor behind the front desk, which features a gallery of black and
white photographs of the Roosevelt family. The spacious lobby is lined with
5,000 linear feet of textbooks and floor-to-ceiling windows to create a bright
and airy space warmed up with Persian-inspired rugs, mid-century light
fixtures and pops of Cornell Big Red hues throughout. The lobby is also home
to the hotel’s full-service, all-day restaurant with a statement wraparound
bar anchoring the space and a variety of inviting lounge seating.
 
Graduate
Roosevelt Island boasts 224 spacious guest rooms and suites including a
Presidential Suite spanning over 1,100 square feet and ideal for entertaining.
Contrasting the modern architecture with warm design details, the guest rooms
offer a familiar, residential experience paired with unrivaled views of the
East River and Manhattan skyline. The décor plays with technology throughout
the ages as seen through lamps with a Morse code of the Cornell fight song on
the base, a neon light fixture inspired by a science project from a Cornell
alum, floating glass desks and integrated audiovisual devices. Local elements
and nods to Roosevelt Island are also incorporated throughout the guest rooms.
Design highlights include benches upholstered with oil painting-like tapestry
of Dutch colonial life, custom art pieces created by Matt Buchholz and
Brooklyn-based artist Ashley Cunningham and a thoughtfully curated gallery
wall showcasing unique pieces including portraits of prominent figures in the
island’s history such as Nellie Bly and Mae West.
 
Food &
Beverage
Los Angeles-based hospitality team and New York City natives,
Med Abrous and Marc Rose of
Call Mom are the
exclusive food and beverage partners at Graduate Roosevelt Island, marking the
duo’s homecoming and their third collaboration with Graduate Hotels, which
also includes Graduate Seattle and Graduate Nashville. The hotel includes the
full-service restaurant, Anything At All, on the ground level; The Panorama
Room, an extraordinary indoor-outdoor rooftop bar and lounge with
unobstructed, sweeping views of the city; and, over 3,000 square feet of
onsite flexible meeting space all concepted and operated by Abrous and
Rose.
 
Abrous and Rose have tapped a talented, female-led team
including Executive Chef Ja’Toria Harper, Pastry Chef Lindsey Verardo and
Beverage Director Estelle Bossy to oversee all food and beverage programs.
Opening later in June, Anything At All will serve breakfast, brunch, lunch and
dinner. Rooted in a vegetable-forward, farm-first approach to contemporary
comfort food, the light-drenched indoor-outdoor space features a sustainable
synergy between the kitchen and the bar whose playful, creative frozen drinks
and seasonal spritzes will take center stage at brunch. In advance of opening,
the ground floor restaurant offers a sneak peek of the menu with a selection
of grab & go items available for takeout and delivery via ChowNow and
DeliverZero, the innovative service which delivers food in reusable
containers. Additionally, Rose and Abrous have partnered with Brooklyn’s
Variety Coffee which will be served at the hotel in addition to the solar and
battery-powered Poindexter Coffee Bike Cart that will be parked out front
offering coffee and a curated selection of morning and afternoon grab-and-go
items.
 
Situated atop the hotel, The Panorama Room, is the
stunning 168-seat rooftop bar and lounge designed by James Beard Foundation
Award-winning design firm, Parts and Labor Design. Opening in July 2021, the
crown jewel of the property will evoke a sense of cinematic drama inspired by
futurism creating a true destination for fashion-forward elegance in an
intimate space all set against unobstructed city views.
 
“It’s
an inexplicable feeling to return to our hometown and have a hand in creating
a bold, new destination within this great city,” said Med Abrous and Marc
Rose, founders and owners of Call Mom. “Alongside our longtime partners and
collaborators at Graduate Hotels and the Roosevelt Island community, we can’t
wait to offer a sense of discovery as both locals and visitors experience our
restaurant, bar, and spaces in between for world-class cocktails, inventive
yet comforting dishes and enveloping hospitality.”
 
The
hotel’s third floor features a variety of distinct multi-use meeting and event
spaces set against clear skyline views, offering the perfect venue for every
occasion from weddings to off-site corporate meetings. This summer, Graduate
Hotels has transformed its ballroom into a space for collaboration inspired by
the iconic film BIG. Known as “The Loft” at Graduate Roosevelt Island, this
pop culture moment creates an opportunity for families, local businesses and
private groups to catch up on lost time in a space that sparks creative energy
and taps into the power of nostalgia. “The Loft” is available for private
bookings
online here
and families can join the fun at Family Saturdays this summer, a series of
kid-friendly activities in partnership with
PlayDay.
 
In 2011, Cornell won a
city-sponsored competition to develop a tech and science campus on Roosevelt
Island including a hotel that could serve visitors, students and the
community. A selection committee of high-profile Cornell alums with ties to
the hospitality and real estate industries selected Graduate Hotels for the
project in 2016 for its ability to create a highly customized experience that
would have a clear and authentic connection to the Cornell campus. Cornell
Tech’s Roosevelt Island campus opened fall 2017. When fully completed, the
campus will include two million square feet of state-of-the-art buildings,
over two acres of open space, and will be home to more than 2,000 graduate
students and hundreds of faculty and staff.
 
Graduate
Roosevelt Island proudly joins the cutting edge, eco-friendly Cornell Tech
campus. The hotel furthers the campus’ ongoing commitment to sustainability
through its LEED-rated architecture and the use of highly efficient materials
and energy saving systems throughout the property. Graduate Roosevelt Island’s
many sustainability initiatives include the LEED-certified architecture, use
of recyclable materials, highly efficient heating, cooling and LED lighting
systems, reduced water consumption, waste reclamation programs, healthy indoor
air quality and more. The food and beverage operators are equally committed to
creating environmentally conscious restaurant operations and culinary programs
including: composting food scraps, recycling programs for restaurant waste, no
single-use plastic products, minimizing food waste and purchasing sustainable,
locally-sourced ingredients and products.

Easily accessible from the F Train, NYC Ferry and the Tramway, Graduate
Roosevelt Island invites locals looking for a convenient getaway from the city
and visitors curious to experience New York City from a new perspective. Rates
start at $219 per night.

More info available at the
Roosevelt Island Graduate Hotel website.



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