Forty years it has been the face of the legendary Upper East Side local, just as the film that made it famous all over the world is twenty-five years old. The story of a son of Italian immigrants who found his fate in New York.
The art of making an unexpected discovery: so the Dutch scholar Pek van Andel defined serendipity, one of the most curious words of the English language. It happens when you lose on the highway and you find a friendship in a service station, or when you miss a recipe and you end up discovering a new taste. In New York, for more than seventy years, serendipity is also an address. Serendipity3 opened in 1954 at 225 East 60th Street, on the Upper East Side, founded by three squattrinated roommates arrived in the city to try to make it: Stephen Bruce, Calvin Holt and Patch Caradine. It is said that it was Caradine who found the name, encountering the word “Serendip” in a crossword. An unexpected discovery, indeed. Hard to start better than that.
Within a few years, that basement full of Tiffany lamps, where they used espresso and pecan pie, became a refuge for artists and celebrities. Andy Warhol, in the beginning, paid the accounts with his designs; Marilyn Monroe studied scripts in front of a Frrrozen Hot Chocolate, the sweet symbol of the house, whose recipe Jacqueline Kennedy tried in vain to get.
Forty years, the keeper of this story is Joe Calderone, who became the face of Serendipity3 and, in a way, his memory. Son of Italian immigrants, he brings with him the country of his parents wherever he goes. «My mother was from Mantua, my father from Palermo», he told us. “I love Italy, I have been there many times. Two years ago I spent a week on Lake Como and one in Sicily. I wish I could return every summer”.
In four decades behind that door, he says, the meaning of the place has not changed by a centimeter. “Serendipity3 for me today means the same thing that meant when I started working here forty years ago: magic. Come in and turn. You can get angry and get out happy, you can get in sad and get out happy. It is a happy place, where magical things happen.”.
Every day visitors come from all over the world to look for this. “They find an escape, a small pleasure. Our menu is an eclectic American cuisine, but the portions are generous. People come here to let themselves go, to give themselves something special.”.
This year marks the 25th anniversary of Serendipity, the romantic comedy with John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale who transformed the restaurant into a pilgrimage destination for lovers. The cinema had already passed from here: the restaurant had appeared in One Fine Day, with Michelle Pfeiffer and George Clooney, and years later it would also appear in television series like Glee. For Calderone, however, that film has a particular weight. “I was here during the shooting, and it was the first film to come out after September 11. It is a love story between two people, of course, but above all it is a declaration of love for this city. That’s what I have left.”.
In the film, Sara enters the restaurant attracted by the name itself, a word she loves for sound and meaning: a lucky case. Yet he does not believe in the case: he is convinced that destiny sends us small signals, and that the way we read them decides if we will be happy. Does Calderone believe in the signs of fate? “Oh, yes. Absolutely. And I feel I have found my destiny being here.”.
Seventy-two years are an eternity for a New York restaurant, and in the meantime the city around continued to reinvent itself. “Tantissimi new buildings, many transformed neighborhoods. But I think the character, the psyche of New Yorkers, has remained the same. In the world they say we’re rude, little friendly. But here are extraordinary people, I really believe”. Serendipity3, in his own way, also found the balance between being faithful to himself and speaking to the new generations. “We have remained those forever, with small adjustments. We are very active on TikTok and Instagram, we create desserts that make people talk, we collaborate with artists of the moment. This is how we remain relevant”.
Before greeting him, we didn’t resist a last question: if New York was a dessert, what would it be? Calderone did not hesitate. “It would be something of our menu called The Outrageous Banana Split. Because it is huge, it is crazy, it is exaggerated, and everyone wants it».
Article Joe Calderone: “Serendipity3 is magic, and it has always been” comes from IlNewyorkese.
