The Wright restaurant at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, at
1071 Fifth Avenue (Photo credit: Peter Aaron/ESTO)

Here’s your daily dose of blasphemy: as someone who has never greatly loved the architecture of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum
at 1071 Fifth Avenue at 89th Street, I must say that its new restaurant, the Wright, located across from the rotunda at 88th Street and designed by Andre Kikoski, is easily the best part of the building.

Unquestionably, the Guggenheim was unprecedented in its day and it served its function admirably as an instant landmark. But it was, and remains, hell to inhabit and, despite Frank Lloyd Wright’s insistent talk about organic forms, the place he designed has always felt cold, bullying and even a little shoddy in its workmanship.

So it was an unexpected pleasure recently to visit the new eatery and find that, even as it pays elaborate homage to the famous architect, it somehow manages to recreate the Guggenheim’s formal vocabulary with greater skill and feeling than it had the first time around, 50 years ago. [more]