Famed New York chef Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s ambitious Tin Building restaurants and food hall are no more.
The sprawling 50,000-square-foot Tin Building complex on New York’s Seaport, which included multiple restaurants and bars, closed permanently on Feb. 23. Seaport Entertainment Group, or SEG, which owns the property, announced the Tin Building will be transformed this summer into the Balloon Museum, which will bring “category-defining contemporary art” to the Seaport.
The closures mark the end of the reportedly $200 million vision to transform the Seaport into a culinary destination.
Vongerichten initially developed the plan for the waterfront site—previously the Fulton Street Fish Market—in lower Manhattan with The Howard Hughes Corporation, or HHC. The project included a reworking of The Fulton restaurant, and a culinary marketplace with several outlets. HHC in 2022 made a $55 million investment with Vongerichten’s restaurant group to fuel broader expansion.
In addition to The Fulton, restaurants in the two-story Tin Building included The Frenchman’s Dough, which was Italian with a French twist; the Chinese concept House of the Red Pearl; and T. Brasserie, with a menu reflecting Vongerichten’s birthplace of Alsace.
Also at the venue was the breakfast-lunch concept Double Yolk; the sweet and savory Crepes & Dosas; a coffeeshop and several bars.
HHC, however, later reportedly spun off the project into SEG, which continues to hold a 25% stake in Vongerichten’s restaurant group, according to public earnings reports.
Despite SEG’s efforts to reinvigorate the waterfront site with events and festivals, the Tin Building wasn’t able to generate the needed foot traffic to support the collection of retail, restaurants and bars.
SEG reported flagging sales across the Tin Building project’s hospitality segment last year. The company blamed a 4% revenue decline in the third quarter on lower revenues at the Tin Building and softness at some of the standalone restaurants, according to a transcript of third-quarter earnings on Alpha-Sense.
SEG restructured its partnership with Vongerichten’s group, converting it from a management contract to a licensing arrangement, which allowed the landlord to reduce fees and bring the employee base in house, the company said in the November earnings call.
Vongerichten’s group did not immediately respond to requests for more information.
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