A celebrated restaurant with northern Chinese cuisine that gets raves at The Shard in London will be opening in the former Le Cirque space, The Post has learned.
The London-based Aqua Restaurant Group quietly signed a lease at the end of last year with Vornado Realty Trust for an 18,750-square-foot spot in which to install its Hutong concept eatery.
When it opens at the end of this year or in early 2019, the restaurant will have an entrance from the spacious cobblestone courtyard off East 58th Street, where both the Bloomberg Tower at 731 Lexington Ave. and the One Beacon luxury condominium also have lobbies.
Michael Hirschfeld, Brian Hirschfeld, Paul Berkman and Davie Berke of JLL represented the restaurant group.
Steve Roth, Vornado’s chairman, worked closely with Aqua’s David Yeo and his partner, Richard Ward, on every aspect of the deal and architecture for its very first North American restaurant.
Aqua was founded 15 years ago and now has 25 venues across Hong Kong, London and Beijing.
The advent of the restaurant was revealed but went unnoticed during a Vornado conference call that merely mentioned it achieved higher rents.
