Alex von Bidder, our New Yorker of the Month February 2009

Ask a New Yorker: I’m sitting in a landmark room inside the Four Seasons Restaurant with the co-owner of the restaurant, Alex Von Bidder. The Four Seasons is located at 99 East 52nd Street, The Seagram Building.

Alex: The only landmark restaurant in Manhattan. It’s a wonderful space. Were sitting under a Richard Lipold sculpture, and it consists of about 11,800 metal rods. It’s pretty cool when you’re sober and it’s even cooler when you’ve had a few glasses of wine.

Ask a New Yorker: Thank you, Mr. Lipold and also Mr. Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (architect of the building).

Alex: It really relates well with the chains. The moving chains on the windows are very, very famous. Philip Johnson, who helped with the design of this space, told me the story. He had an office upstairs and they started hanging these chains. They finished a few of the window panes and the chains started to move. The installers absolutely freaked out and said, “oh my God! What’s happening here?’” They called Philip Johnson down to take a look. His response, “I’m a genius”. So, it was totally unintended to have this chains moving on the windows like this with the ripple-effect.

Ask a New Yorker: Magical, what’s the explanation to the rippling effect?

Alex: It’s the temperature difference between the outside temperature and the inside temperature. It is a single pane of glass, and when the inside air hits it, it either chills it or it is heated. So it either goes up or down. It will go in some direction as long as there is a temperature difference, and that makes the chains move. It’s probably the most famous feature of the architecture here, again by accident.

Ask a New Yorker: I understand The Four Season is celebrating a milestone?

Alex: Well, actually, it’s an anniversary of the entire year. This year 2009 marks 50 years for The Four Seasons. We opened in July 1959, so we started celebrating already. We’re celebrating with a special menu $59.00 for 1959. It’s an appetizer, a main course and dessert. Many of the items are nostalgic. The menu paper is nostalgic. It’s the whole thing that you can come here and taste something as it was it 1959. It’s cool.

Ask a New Yorker: Thank God for 1959. Great price, can’t wait to try the breast of Long Island duck, Grand Marnier sauce. How did The Four Seasons name come about?

Alex: You have to put yourself back into the 50’s in New York. At that time there really was no such thing as an American restaurant. All of the fancy restaurants were French. There were some Italian restaurants, Chinese and Japanese and probably Spanish restaurants. So when Restaurants Associates and Joe Baum saw this space they wanted to create a restaurant that was American which had an allegiance to the seasons. So the Four Seasons referred to the menus which would always change with the season. In the days of the 50’s the big thing was frozen food. TV dinners and frozen food were the new invention. You didn’t have to wait for strawberries to ripen. You could freeze them and keep them. That’s what you lived on. The Four Seasons was a restaurant that said, ‘No, no, no, this is not the way it’s done. You should have seasonal food, local food and you should support your local farmers.’ This was a very new concept in 1959. James Beard was probably the most knowledgeable guru who was around at the time. He was the menu consultant. All the people involved in 1959 became famous in their own right later. Phillip Johnson certainly the dean of architecture, Richard Lipold as I mentioned earlier, a really famous artist. Mimi Sheraton was involved. She became the food restaurant critic for The New York Times.

Ask a New Yorker: Do you meet lots of powerful people?

Alex: Yes I do. That’s one of the fun parts of my job. Forbes magazine once said that The Four Seasons has more power personalities per square foot than even the White House. That is true because it entertains people from all walks of life and that makes it really interesting for me.

Ask a New Yorker: I’m not famous or powerful yet when I’ve dined here I have always been treated as though I was someone special. This is an interesting hospitality rule, everyone gets treated the same when they walk in?

Alex: Yes, we pride ourselves in that. Obviously people that come all the time, we get to know them really well. Many people who come from all over the world and they come maybe twice a year or so. Julian Niccolini, my partner, and I have been at the front desk for over thirty years every day. So it’s kind of hard to sneak by us. We will recognize you if you’ve been here before. It’s much more fun when you treat everybody this way because all of a sudden you have a house full of friends. It’s really cool.

Ask a New Yorker: I’ve seen in Vanity Fair actual seating charts for regulars. Does Barry Diller have his own table?

Alex: He’s one of the few actually. There’s really no secret to it. If you’ve supported us 30-40 years obviously you get use to your waiter or your table. So we try to have it available. The Bronfman family has been coming here since 1959 longer then we have. And Phillip Johnson ate here every day for lunch. So how can you tell a 90 year old that your table is not available, that doesn’t work. So that’s really what it goes by. It’s really the kind of table. If we know that you like to sit side by side or you like to sit in a corner. This is what we make sure of. Now usually when you see those diagrams we just make them up. There usually not true at all. We get a kick out of it.

Ask a New Yorker: What else are you up to? You’ve written a book, I understand.

Alex: Well, I didn’t write a book, I caused a book to be written. At that time-- it was probably about ten years ago-- I had never tried to write. Crown Publishing liked the idea of having a history of the restaurant. My goal was to have something written that would tell my daughter where I spent her youth. I’m not sure she ever read it. I’ll have to ask her. My purpose was to interview everybody involved with the restaurant so that when they pass away, it would be a record of what they were thinking, the guest, the creators, and the people who ran the restaurant. I got John Mariani, who is a very good restaurant writer, to actually write the text. So he deserves the credit.

Ask a New Yorker: I love your Long Island farmhouse duck, baked lady apple entrée. Is there anything on the menu that you could eat every day?

Alex: I’m not a daily basis kind of guy. I need change on a daily basis. One of our mottos is, ’May we always change’, and I think that would come into seasonal specialties. Right now we have a venison ragout with spinach spaetzle. That reminds me of something my grandparents would serve. The chef is Swiss like I am. It’s like a home cooked meal for me. But it would be much too heavy for me to have every day. So today I had gravlocks. The gravlocks is very light, it’s very good for me, much better than a heavy venison stew. So I like to change every day.

Ask a New Yorker: Me too, but that duck is delicious. When was the last time you had a hot dog on the street?

Alex: I don’t remember, but it must have been at the circus. It’s not that I shy away from it. Actually the best street food I ever had was in Japan. They had better street food then they had in restaurants. Here, I don’t have occasion to do that. Maybe I should do it more often.

Ask a New Yorker: What are some of your hobbies?

Alex: More than hobbies. I really like doing a lot of different things. I have a palette of passions. I think the British are good at that. They say, you know, let’s be an amateur at everything. I deepen my knowledge in yoga. I’ve been teaching yoga for six or seven years. That’s more than a past time for me, that’s a rest-of-my-life kind of thing. I’m a competitive sailor. I race antique sailboats. I started writing a column for Best Life Magazine. It’s a really terrific magazine for men over 40. So, it’s a more serious magazine than just clothing and watches and cars. I’m wring a column about executive Zen, how to deal with real issues. So the current issue is about transforming your fear of financial insecurity. Check it out.

Ask a New Yorker: How would you describe the dance between you and Julian Niccolini?

Alex: I would describe it anywhere from a slow tango to a jitter bug. Probably not many people remember what a jitter bug is. But it’s an arranged marriage and some of those marriages are very good. In our case it’s very good. We fight almost every day but we don’t fight against we fight for. The restaurant is our baby and we have different ways of looking at it. I think the combination of his daily pushing for better quality and my steady long range plan is a very good combination.

Ask a New Yorker: As you said, you like to sail.

Alex: There is something about old things. Old wooden boats are so wonderful. My boat is from 1928. It was designed by Nat Herreshoff, Captain Nat, and it’s the oldest class of boats still racing against each other. It’s called an S boat. So what is it about wooden boats? Wooden boats, when you hit the wave right, when you hit the groove, we say they start to smile. Plastic boats don’t smile. They sound different and they feel different. Wooden boats are alive. They have character. They have soul. When I’m on this boat, I know that since 1928--the boat named Dilemma-- has taken care of a lot of men in many ways and kept them safe. I’ve been in some awfully dangerous situations and the boat took care of me. I take care of the boat. They are totally impractical as far as maintenance is concerned, because it takes a lot of man hours. Someone once said there are three things worth doing in life. One is to build something new. Second is to take care of something old. And the third is to think about either one of these two while petting your dog.

Ask a New Yorker: I love it. Do you have a dog, what’s his name?

Alex: Not at the moment. He was run over. (laughter)

Ask a New Yorker: You are one dapper New Yorker. Where do you get your suits?

Alex: All my suits are made by Alan Flusser. He is an original New Yorker. Alan Flusser is a world authority on men’s fashion. He has a wonderful book out called Dressing the Man: Mastering the Art of Permanent Fashion.

Ask a New Yorker: What’s your definition of a New Yorker?

Alex: The incredible thing about this city is that everybody, anybody can become a New Yorker. It is impossible anywhere else in the world. You and I cannot move to Tokyo and become Japanese. You will always be the gaijin. You will always be the foreigner. This is the only place in the world were a guy from a little village in Switzerland can learn the language, be accepted and become part of the scene. I am a New Yorker.

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