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Longtime New York City-based restaurateur Sheldon “Shelly” Fireman died at the age of 93, his company, Fireman Hospitality Group, announced last week.
Born in The Bronx, Fireman opened his first restaurant in 1963 in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. The Hip Bagel, which stayed in business for nearly 20 years, was a musically themed shop with sandwiches named after instruments — Drum had bacon and Swiss cheese; Piccolo was made with ham, lettuce, tomato, walnuts, and cream cheese.
He went on to open numerous restaurants, specializing in high-volume venues in the city’s theater district, starting with Café Fiorello near Lincoln Center in 1974; it’s still open and reportedly thriving. The company also runs Paris Bar, Bond 45, two locations of Brooklyn Delicatessen, Brooklyn Diner, Redeye Grill, and Trattoria Dell’Arte, all catering to theater goers and tourists.
Fireman Hospitality also operates Bond 45 and Fiorella Italian Kitchen in the Washington, D.C., area. Additionally, it’s a management company that provides catering for the Hilton Club in Manhattan and the North Salem Horse Show in upstate New York.
The company says it serves more than two million guests per year and enjoys sales of $80 million. That’s driven in large part by repeat customers and word of mouth — rather than invest in advertising, the company was letting its customers do its marketing long before anyone had heard of social media.
Fireman was an expert in Italian food, having fallen in love with the cuisine at an early age. He had a home in the Tuscan artist community of Pietrosanta and traveled the rest of the country frequently. Many of his restaurants specialize in classic Italian food with extensive antipasti selections. They are also decorated with Fireman’s sculptures, including his famous bronze nudes.
He also partnered with a variety of designers to develop his restaurants, including Milton Glaser for Trattoria Dell’arte and David Korins for Bond 45.
Although operating mostly in an extremely trend-focused city, Fireman didn’t chase trends or cater to “influencers.” Instead, he unashamedly courted the pre-theater crowd of out-of-town guests and suburbanites coming into the city for dinner and a show. His restaurants’ food, mostly Italian and American, has broad appeal for guests from across the globe.
“What people get when they eat at our restaurants is a wonderful time,” he said in an interview earlier this year.
Fireman Hospitality CEO Ben Grossman made the following statement about Fireman’s passing:
“Shelly was our iconic founder and guiding light for the Fireman Hospitality Group for over 50 years. I think it would be impossible to find another restaurateur with so many enduring concepts.
He had an unbelievable passion for this business. He never wanted to stop developing new concepts and bringing them to life.
It is a testament to this desire that he opened three restaurants at 93 last year – Paris Bar at the Le Meridien Hotel, Café Fiorello in Washington, D.C. and a Brooklyn Deli at JFK (airport).
He was a lifelong learner. He never wanted to stop finding new ways to think about restaurants. Towards the end of his life, when I approached his office, I would hear him trying to work with ChatGPT or another AI app to try to find a better way to create menus or design restaurants.
He loved every aspect of the restaurant business — the design and branding part, the menu development, the execution of it all. There was no detail that was too small for him to obsess about.
He loved New York. He loved being part of the cultural centers of New York.”
There was also an outpouring of sympathy and fond memories from the New York City restaurant community.
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Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected]
