Where THE STROKES Where Brought THEIR GIRLFRIENDS
(And Then Other Girlfriends)
THERE’S A CERTAIN kind of restaurant that feels fancy when you’re young and broke and brand new to the city, as I was in 1999, the year Lavagna opened on East 5th Street just west of Avenue B. By the time I started hanging out there in the midaughts, the rustic Italian joint was part clubhouse, part grown-up restaurant that adults hadn’t spoiled: It was ours.
The Strokes were and remain the most enduring regulars. “Brett
first brought them,” recalls the restaurant’s owner, Yorgos
Hatziefthimiou, referring to Brett Kilroe, the art director at the Strokes’ label, RCA, who designed the cover of their 2001 debut album, Is This It. “The Strokes started bringing their families, their girlfriends, and the other girlfriends, and their friends,” Hatziefthimiou says. “They were part of the furniture.”
“It was our go-to spot for birthdays and celebrations,” remembers then–strokes manager Ryan Gentles.
The guys from the National and Kings of Leon, Adam Green of the Moldy Peaches, and Jack White “and his band of the moment,” as Hatziefthimiou puts it, were also regulars, along with “comedians who were friends with the Strokes,” like David Cross and Andy Samberg, with whom Hatziefthimiou wound up playing on an indoor soccer team assembled by Strokes lead singer Julian Casablancas. Behind the bar all these years later, there’s still a trophy they won in a tournament at Chelsea Piers.
I don’t live in New York anymore, but the last time I was at Lavagna, this past November, Gentles was there, too, celebrating his 46th birthday with a table full of friends. It’s still his go-to spot.