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  • One Bryant Park's Culinary Director Tadaaki Ishizaki (Odo, Château Restaurant Joël Robuchon) will helm its Main Dining Room, a reimagined kaiseki restaurant with 60 seats and a 20-seat cocktail bar. The youngest and most avant-garde of One Bryant Park's three chefs, he is shaping a new expression of Japanese cuisine-one that honors tradition while creating something distinctly modern and original." He endeavors to develop an unprecedented style of Japanese dining and present his new vision of Japanese cuisine through precision, creativity, and a profound sense of seasonality. 

    The cadre of his practice is undoubtedly the tradition of social kaiseki, which emerged over three centuries ago with the rise of the merchant class during the Edo period in Japanese history. His work embodies its idea of iki ("understated elegance, seasonal sensitivity, sophistication"), while focusing on eight key seasonal turning points during the year when changes in weather, physical sensations, and ingredients become conspicuous. He expresses seasonality through surprising combinations of global ingredients, juxtapositions of textual contrasts, novel presentations, emotion, and use of unconventional tableware. 

    Living over a decade in New York, a hub of international inspiration, his food is like the integration of social kaiseki, Ferran Adrià, Salvador Dalí, Ryuichi Sakamoto, and his own personal sensibilities. After three centuries, we finally have a chef, who is brazenly rethinking social kaiseki-preserving tradition while embracing innovation and democratization, offering a cuisine to further human connection and revitalize the soul.

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  • With over two decades of international culinary experience spanning Japan, France, and the United States, Shuji Furukawa (Restaurant Yuu, Kyo Ya) is the Executive Chef of the Main Dining Room. 

    Prior to One Bryant Park, he was Executive Chef of Restaurant Yuu, Gallery by Odo, Autre Kyo Ya, and Kyo Ya. Furukawa's culinary foundation was shaped in France at Ze Kitchen Galerie and Les Berceaux, where he developed a deep respect for French techniques, ingredient integrity, and disciplined kitchen structure. However, his career began in Japan, working at Bouquet de France in Tokyo and Maison de Yoshida in Fukuoka, where he built his classical foundation and cultivated his dedication to craftsmanship. 

    Throughout his career, he has demonstrated expertise in team leadership, menu innovation, and creating refined dining experiences tailored to individual guests. He brings a global perspective to his cuisine while maintaining meticulous attention to detail and respect for seasonal ingredients.

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  • John Shin brings a distinctly New York perspective to One Bryant Park, shaped by his experience at some of the city’s most celebrated restaurants and bars. 

    He began his career at The NoMad Hotel as a Bar Prep, where he spent two years developing a foundation in cocktail preparation, from garnishes to syrups and infusions. 

    He later continued to refine his skills in bartending and hospitality at Crown Shy and Blue Hill: Family Meal before joining Major Food Group in 2022 to open Torrisi as Head Bartender. There, he helped build the bar team while developing its cocktail menu and spirits program. At One Bryant Park, Shin is creating a bar experience rooted in New York City drinking culture while incorporating influences from Japanese cuisine. 

    His approach is spirited, classic, and approachable, with a menu designed to feel familiar yet distinctly reflective of One Bryant Park. Evolving with the seasons, the program balances the energy and character of New York with Japanese sensibilities, creating an experience that encourages guests to return and feel a sense of belonging. Outside of the bar, Shin enjoys exploring New York’s restaurants and bars, cooking, and discovering new sources of culinary inspiration.

Portrait of a smiling chef in a white culinary jacket standing in a warmly lit restaurant kitchen

  • Born and raised in New York City, Executive Baker Daichi Ebato will lead the baking team to showcase outstanding Japanese inspired breads. He has worked for various bakeries and restaurants in New York City during the past fifteen years, including Le Pain Quotidien, Runner & Stone, Hot Bread Kitchen, and within the city's most esteemed hospitality restaurant empires (Dinex Robuchon/Bastion, and Mattos). 

    Known for his insightful knowledge of bread baking, dough management and solutions, he brings a special level of experience and technique to the team at One Bryant Park. 

    His approach combines traditional baking fundamentals with creativity and a deep appreciation for quality ingredients. He cannot wait to bake the most unique, creative, and delicious breads the city has ever experienced.

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  • One Bryant Park's pastry program is led by Executive Pastry Chef Allen Cheung (Buddakan, The Breslin), who has worked for over two decades in pastry kitchens at nearly a dozen, diverse restaurants across the city. 

    A lifelong New Yorker, his sweets always have reflected his multiethnic hometown through smart combinations of ingredients from different cultures. Further emphasizing the local, he often frequents and sources his ingredients from the city's numerous green-markets. 

    His desserts delight through humor, whimsical compositions, guest interactivity, and a sense of place. At One Bryant Park, he will execute a rotating menu of seasonal desserts and afternoon-tea service, incorporating his style, rare Japanese ingredients, table-side presentations, and, of course, his love for New York.

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  • A lifelong New Yorker, Leo Lê grew up in a family of restaurateurs. In the late 1970s, his grandaunt established one of the United States’ first Vietnamese restaurants, Vietnam Village, in Greenwich Village, New York City. In the 1980s, his mother was chef-owner of several Vietnamese restaurants in Rochester, New York, of all places. She dished out authentic, pan-Vietnamese fare while he did his homework at Table 3 or collected payment from guests at the register. Unbeknownst to him, these settings set the stage for his unexpected over-two-decade career in hospitality. 

    While training to become an art historian at university throughout the 2000s, Lê worked at Japanese sushi restaurants not only for fast money, but in retrospect, to fill voids in his life: kitchen aromas, clinking glassware, laughter, and birthday serenades. Through stints at nine restaurants from Long Island to Manhattan, he became evermore infatuated with Japanese sake and French wine, and has since put his academic career on hiatus to embrace hospitality with both arms. As sommelier for Uchu, the 10-seat omakase bar helmed by Chef Eiji Ichimura, he facilitated in garnering two Michelin stars for the restaurant during its entire lifespan, which has been a source of pride for him ever since. 

    Presently, Lê has undertaken the beverage directorship of the restaurants of the hospitality group, Listen & Feel, including Momoya Upper West Side, Momoya SoHo, Happy Tuna, Kappo Sono, and One Bryant Park. At these establishments, he exhibits his interests of the last twenty-three years through the beverage traditions of Japan and France. His beverage programs compile all his favorite sake, Champagne, and Burgundy, which he tasted throughout the years and are available in the United States. He loves sharing the history of sake brewing and wine making with guests, enhancing their drinking experience. Moreover, he enjoys comparing the characteristics of Japanese sake and French wine, which have continued to become evermore similar throughout his career.

    During Lê’s weekends, he always dines out, often at his favorite restaurants, one of which is the Italian-Southern-American restaurant Popina. Like masterpieces of visual art, he considers the best restaurants the ones that have staying power, which you continue to think about incessantly because of their professionalism, warm hospitality, thoughtful beverages, and well-designed atmospheres. He also loves Gallaghers, Zaltos, daiquiris, Jacques Torres’ cookies, cashmere and sneakers, Félix González-Torres, Toni Morrison and Ocean Vương, Luis Buñuel and Wong Kar-wai, Billie Holiday, spa days, Le Negresco in Nice, and his significant other, of course. A self-proclaimed sybarite, he lives to work hard, to drink hard, and to advance hard to a life that is absolutely devoid of asceticism. Because life is too short.