Forty Two, the restaurant at the Clinton Presidential Center, is getting a redo, expanding its space, extending its meal service and changing its name to 42 bar & table, the Clinton Center announced today.
In addition to regular hours, 42 bar & table (yes, lower case and an ampersand) will be open for dinner from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m. Thursday through Saturday starting Nov. 2, and the bar will be open until midnight those nights. Picture a late-night drink on the riverside patio, next to one of three fire pits, in comfy furniture or dinner tables or at rail seating along the east and west walls. Sounds sort of sophisticated to this writer.
Indoors will be a bar area with seating, charging stations and handbag hangers. Banquettes are also being installed.
42 bar & table will have a new menu as well as a new look, incorporating some of the meals Executive Chef Gilbert Alaquinez created for the Around the World Thursday meals along with regular favorites.
This new feature has huge appeal: You won’t have to go through security to dine at 42 bar & table: A new staircase just left of the Clinton Center entrance will lead directly downstairs to the restaurant’s lobby. Nor will you have to hike from the parking lot; valet service will be free.
The restaurant will remain open during the renovation. Lunch is served 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Monday through Saturday.
Garry Mertins designed the new dining spaces; Steve Rousseau and Polk Stanley Wilcox were architects.