Inside Hotel Chelsea’s secret basement sushi restaurant

If you ventured into the cellar of the Hotel Chelsea shortly before the dawn of the New Millennium, you’d find yourself inside one of the buzziest nightclubs in Manhattan. Founded by British expat Serena Bass, the red-walled, barrel-vaulted space slung cosmopolitans and celebrities (guests included everyone from Johnny Rotten to Monica Lewinsky) in equal measure. When Serena shut in 2004, subsequent revitalisation efforts petered out, leaving Chelsea’s basement empty for about a decade.

No more: this spring, a new hot spot has arrived in the Hotel Chelsea’s underbelly in the form of a stylish Japanese restaurant and sushi bar. Called Teruko, the concept draws from the hotel’s bohemian past while marking the final jewel in the hotel’s years-long transformation.

Wallpaper* dines at Teruko, New York

The mood: Chelsea goes wabi-sabi

Teruko joins three existing dining concepts by Sunday Hospitality group and partner Charles Seich, which are nested inside the Hotel Chelsea – a café, a plush bar, and El Quijote, a Spanish restaurant that has been in operation since 1930. But you’ll have to look hard to find the entrance to Teruko; a set of stairs abutting a guitar shop will take you below street level and into the cool, underground eatery.

For the interiors, Sean MacPherson, co-owner of Hotel Chelsea, wanted to conjure a sense of East meets West. ‘I strived to delicately set a Japanese aesthetic inside the decidedly western context of Hotel Chelsea,’ MacPherson tells us.

That started with the hotel’s namesake and inspiration, the Japanese-born artist Teruko Yokoi. The painter was a one-time resident of the Hotel Chelsea (the property still has a few dozen full-time tenants) and painted lyrical, abstract landscapes, which are now displayed throughout the restaurant’s dining spaces. MacPherson and his team relied on materials like dark, reclaimed timber, Japanese denim, rattan and stone to give the restaurant a moody, wabi-sabi atmosphere, in contrast to Yokoi’s vibrant paintings.

But the biggest move is the bar, which was salvaged from the Hotel Okura’s Orchid Bar in Tokyo and shipped to New York. ‘Hopefully diners will feel like they are dining in the Japanese wing of the Hotel Chelsea,’ MacPherson adds.

The food: subterranean sushi and so much more

Once you’ve sunk into a velvet-clad banquette and your eyes have adjusted to the seductively low light, it’s a good idea to start with a cocktail. If you’re a martini person, go for the gari martini, where gin or vodka is mellowed with a kick of pickled ginger and an umami hit of white soy. Japanese whisky lovers, meanwhile, will be drawn to the Teruko highball, which marries a quartet of the spirit; or the Kinoko Old Fashioned, which gives a classic a twist via shiitake mushrooms, vetiver, and awamori, a rice spirit. In-house specialists, including director of bars Brian Evans and George Padilla of Sunday Hospitality, are close at hand to guide you through the restaurant’s extensive menu of wine, sake and Japanese whisky, of which Teruko has the largest collection in North America.

Drink in hand, it’s time to indulge in the cuisine developed by executive chef Tadashi Ono. But what to choose? A must is the tuna sashimi, delicately sliced and served alongside avocado with an umami miso-mustard sauce. Or the wagyu tartare, topped with a quail egg and sprinkled with sesame seeds. How about the fried burdock root, which proves earthy, crisp and addictive?

There’s even more in store. Don’t miss the red snapper, which is cooked in hot oil so that the crispy scales stand up, and arrives swimming in an unctuous daikon-dashi broth. If you’re craving perfectly tender wagyu, opt for the Washugyu Misuji, in which thinly-sliced flatiron steak is prepared alongside a slightly sweet miso glaze. Bold diners will seek out the wagyu strip, which, at $165, is as indulgent as it sounds. Head sushi chef Hideaki Watanabe, meanwhile, crafts melt-in-your-mouth cuts of fatty tuna, sea bream, and yellowtail.

Even the most stuffed diners would be wise to reach for dessert, even if there’s no room left. The Crepe Teruko is a perfect grand finale, arriving flambé and with a zippy, bitter-sweet citrus syrup. Add a nightcap of whisky (the rarest of which will set you back thousands of dollars per pour) or a grassy bowl of frothy matcha and you’ll be ready to drift back up the stairs, preferably slightly tipsy, wondering from whence you came – Tokyo, New York or something delightfully in-between.

Teruko is located at 222 W 23rd St, New York, NY 10011, United States.