Casa Tua

Casa Tua began two decades ago as a house-turned-restaurant in Miami Beach, and its first New York outpost sits inside The Surrey, A Corinthia Hotel, on a quiet Upper East Side block off Madison Avenue. Michele Bonan designed the rooms: low lighting, dark wood and leather, custom Italian furniture and shelves of books and objects, so it feels more like a well-kept private home than a hotel restaurant. Photographs by Richard Avedon, Herb Ritts and Irving Penn hang on the walls as part of a rotating art program.

The ground-floor restaurant and its lounge are open to everyone — the members' club is upstairs — and serve Italian and Mediterranean cooking at breakfast, lunch and dinner every day. Expect fritto misto, minestrone, pastas with slow-cooked meats, hamachi crudo and steaks, then a cappuccino or a cocktail in the lounge. It is a dress-up, special-occasion room that also works for a long, quiet lunch.