Fricked Off: Furious Frick Neighbors Sound Off On UES Party Plans

UPPER EAST SIDE, NY — The Frick Collection is fighting for their right to party, but neighbors say they're being left in the dark about what the museum actually plans to do.

A new application from the prestigious museum inside the Frick Mansion — the former sprawling palace of American industrialist Henry Clay Frick — is seeking to have all options on the table regarding events when the space reopens after its current $160 million renovation and expansion project is completed late next year.

In their new liquor license application reviewed by Patch, the museum would be allowed to have up to 17 bars slinging drinks, with up to 14 floors of the Frick — possibly even conservation areas — open to events, no stated event capacity limits, parties that could last until 4 a.m. and even bicycle deliveries.

Neighbors from the East 70th Street Block Association said that The Frick only gave them details on Friday, forcing them to spend the weekend scrutinizing the details of the application.

"The Block Association was shocked to see a proposal for 17 liquor service bars," said the group's attorney and former Upper East Side City Council Member Ben Kallos at a Community Board 8 Street Life Committee meeting Tuesday night.

Kallos calculated, according to the Frick's application, that comes out to over 200 linear feet of bar service.

"It is hard to fathom how many attendees would warrant 17 liquor service bars with 204 linear feet of bartenders," Kallos said.

In a letter the Block Association sent to the community board, neighbors want the Frick to agree to stipulations to avoid future Frick fracas over potential all-nighters.

Some of those stipulations include only hosting five liquor bars, a 400 person capacity for the collections areas, end times for events around 9 p.m., no bicycle deliveries and more details about garbage, deliveries and other clarifications to what they called "defects" in the application.

The Frick said that the group was overreacting, and that they have no plans to have more, or larger, events when they reopen.

"This is not a catering hall," said the attorney representing The Frick, former Upper East Side State Assembly Member and prior boss to Kallos, Jonathan Bing.

"This is a restaurant that's going to take place in the Frick Collection building," Bing said. "That is the primary purpose of this of this application. There will be a limited number of events in the building, as there always have been probably dating back since 1934."

Kallos rebuffed his former boss, for whom he served as chief of staff to back in 2008.

"Their licensed area isn't for the restaurant," he said. "If it was for a 900 square foot restaurant, we wouldn't be here. It's for 11 floors, in some places, 14 floors in others."

"They have an overbroad license area where they're saying they want the entire building, including their conservation studios which would be included in the entire building, [to] have a liquor license," Kallos said.

Kallos comments, Bing said, insinuating that he was "not following the rules...hurts me personally," but he otherwise rebuffed efforts asking the Frick to reach an agreement on stipulations with their neighbors.

Leslie Samuels, president of the East 70th Block Association said that if the Frick just wanted to continue hosting events as they had in the past, that would be fine with them.

But an earlier meeting in November about The Frick's reopening lacked any of the details in the application, and left the neighbors feeling blindsided by the proposal.

"We need to ensure that The Frick is not subject to pressures for revenue sources that would effectively transform the museum into a fancy catering called the Tops Cipriani," Samuels speculated at Tuesday's meeting. "But the Frick's proposal here would permit an unlimited number of private, after-hour events."

Joe Shatoff, chief operating officer of The Frick, told meeting attendees that the museum's expansion was not for new event space, but for larger and more galleries.

Bing signaled some signs that the two groups could learn to live together once again, and said the museum could probably at least agree to stipulations on bicycle deliveries and a 2 a.m. weekend event closure.

The reason for including the catch-all catering-forward liquor license along with the new, unnamed restaurant, Bing said, was to avoid the burden of having to pursue one-day catering permits for events, and will otherwise "be the same as before."

Samuels and other members of his group remained unconvinced and called for the liquor application to be put on pause until the block association and museum could try their hand at sitting down and talking with the full application.

Most attendees at the meeting agreed, including longtime board member Elizabeth Ashby, who said that both sides needed to have their "feet to the fire, and put them in a position where they really have to sort this out."

Bing eventually relented, and said The Frick would try to meet with the group before next week's full board meeting and get a set of stipulations on paper.

"One thing I learned as I represented the Upper East Side," Bing said, "is to always listen to Elizabeth Ashby."