Eleven Madison Park

The story

Eleven Madison Park held the top spot among the World's 50 Best Restaurants in 2017 — the same year its doors were closed for renovation. Danny Meyer opened it in 1998 inside the Metropolitan Life North Building, a grand address facing Madison Square. In 2006, chef Daniel Humm and Will Guidara arrived, and five years later they bought it outright. The kitchen earned three Michelin stars by 2012 and kept them. When the dining room was remade, furnishings that predated the restaurant's opening were deliberately kept.