Seed Library, New York’s First Mr. Lyan Bar, Takes Root in NoMad

<img decoding="async" class="lazyload size-full-width wp-image-1597998" src="data:image/gif;base64,R0lGODlhAQABAAAAACH5BAEKAAEALAAAAAABAAEAAAICTAEAOw==" data-src="https://observer.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2025/11/RHG_SEEDLIBRARY_INTERIOR-3.jpg?quality=80&w=970" alt="" width="970" height="647" data-caption='Mr. Lyan’s Seed Library is now open in New York. <span class=”lazyload media-credit”>Courtesy Nicholas Lee Ruiz</span>’>

New York’s cocktail crowd got intriguing news in September when the account @SeedLibraryNYC appeared on Instagram with an announcement: The city was finally getting its very own bar from Ryan Chetiyawardana, also known as Mr. Lyan. Chetiyawardana’s bars in London, Amsterdam and Washington D.C. are renowned for madcap mixology, so, unsurprisingly, the news was met with breathless media coverage speculating on what New York’s Seed Library would be like. Now, the doors are open and the drinks are pouring. Is it everything Mr. Lyan enthusiasts hoped for?

Fans expecting a wild ride of ingredients filtered through familiar cocktail styles will not be disappointed. I was one of the first to experience New York’s Seed Library; I attended a preview party the day before it opened to the public on November 5. The bar itself is a subterranean space in the Hotel Park Ave (formerly the Mondrian), its entrance at 51 East 30th Street marked by an orange door. Its basement location helps cement the feeling you’ve stolen away into a glowy, buzzy party where you might bump into Bianca Jagger or Paloma Picasso—at this present-day preview, the VIPs filling the room instead were some of New York’s elite bartenders, alongside the city’s well-heeled cocktail connoisseurs. 

Designed by Jacu Strauss, creative director of Hotel Park Ave’s owner, Lore Group, the space leans into a sleek, 1970s glamour that pops against its industrial bones. A warm palette of reds, oranges and browns is accentuated with touches of wood, velvet and metallic elements. 

The menu toes a fastidious line between approachability and adventure, to which Chetiyawardana has applied his signature stamp: classic cocktails remixed with ingredients that challenge preconceived notions of flavor. For example, “Ribs” mixes Glenfiddich 15 with chipotle, mint tea and rosewood. Is it sweet like a spiced caramel? Savory like smoky meat? The answer is both—like a chipotle barbecue sauce, bolstered by woody notes, then lightened and opened up by herbaceous mint.

Then there’s the BC3 Negroni with Fords Gin, Ceylon arrack, pollen-infused vermouth, propolis (a resinous substance made by honeybees) and aged honey. The beverage demonstrates the storytelling Chetiyawardana is known for; the Negroni is an obvious homage to bees, and less overtly, to New York state agriculture, as the honey used here—as well as the beeswax used elsewhere in the Beeswax Old Fashioned—is sourced locally. It’s also a bright riff on one of the most popular cocktails, balancing sweetness with acidity and dancing with grassy, floral notes. 

Spritzy refreshers go down easy, but their ingredients demand a second look, like the Mexicano, crafted with Derrumbes mezcal, Campari, vermouth, hay and cherry soda. Traces of smoky, farmy funk mingle with botanicals and a rounded cherry sweetness, while bubbles lift the entire profile and end it on a dry note. Local New York state purple carrots appear in the Blue Hill 75, a twist on the French 75 with Hendrick’s gin, champagne, and the carrots fermented into a mead of sorts, per Chetiyawardana. He adds that “Blue Hill” refers not to the carrots’ specific provenance, but to Blue Hill Farm and its co-owner Dan Barber’s way of rethinking what seemingly simple vegetables can be. 

Whether your go-to beverage is a martini, margarita, Negroni, old-fashioned or spritz, there’s a version of it on the Seed Library menu that feels like it’s been reimagined through the looking glass, pulling in culinary and local agricultural influences and pushing the envelope on what ingredients can produce which flavors. 

Martini connoisseurs should try the silky and decadent Coriander Seed Gimlet, which is ever so slightly sweet and spiced. The Unfiltered Martini, on the other hand, is a rare weak spot on the menu. Billed as “Haku vodka, really great potato,” it was cloudy and sweet—where one might associate “potato” and “martini” with a bracing potato-based vodka, this martini tasted more like biting into an actual raw potato. Makgeolli fans may recognize and even appreciate the funky profile, but it won’t scratch the itch for a martini purist.

Chetiyawardana takes a refreshing approach to non-alcoholic cocktails, as well. Instead of creating a separate menu of afterthought mocktails and sugary juice concoctions, he offers several of the standard Seed Library options boozeless. The aforementioned gimlet is available with Everleaf Mountain alcohol-free aperitif and coriander seed cordial, while a Pear + Apple + Tonic that utilizes Christian Drouin white calvados, pear brandy and tonic water, is also presented with Almave non-alcoholic agave spirit, pear and apple cordial, shiso and tonic water. 

For his entrée into New York City’s cocktail bar scene, Chetiyawardana could have chosen to import any of his existing concepts—London’s Lyaness, Amsterdam’s Super Lyan, or D.C.’s Silver Lyan—or create something entirely new. Chetiyawardana decided that a second location of Seed Library, which opened in London’s Shoreditch neighborhood in 2022, made the most sense for New York. But he explains to Observer that he doesn’t see this new location as an exact replica of London’s Seed Library; rather, it’s a template he’ll use to build on with local references like those agricultural ingredients.

“Our venues are all focused on a concept born of their place,” Chetiyawardana says. “With Seed Library, we’re responding to where the world is; it’s felt like things are getting too plasticized and there’s a movement away from nature and being with people.” When Seed Library opened in London, its concept revolved around encouraging people to gather, especially post-pandemic. The ideas of a warm space and cocktails incorporating local produce, time-consuming prep methods and storytelling all drove toward that mission—a “seed library” as an organization that cultivates and then shares seeds for the community, which one could argue plays out at Chetiyawardana’s bars in the form of fostering ideas or sharing actual agricultural products as cocktails. He felt this concept would resonate in New York, too. But, barring a few Mr. Lyan classics, the drink menu had to be built from the ground up to cater to New York tastes and incorporate New York ingredients.

To bring the concept to life, Chetiyawardana worked with Hotel Park Ave owner Lore Group and Renwick Hospitality Group, which was recruited to outfit the hotel’s three food-and-beverage spaces.

“When it came to the downstairs space, we knew we needed something unique and special,” Renwick co-owner Gary Wallach tells Observer. “[Lore] had a relationship with Ryan and introduced us. We got to know each other, and decided this was the perfect space to bring something iconic, with this level of detail, to New York.”

For Chetiyawardana, finding the right partners was key to finally opening in New York.

“New York has always been in the cards. When I was living in Edinburgh and my sister was living in New York, we were planning to open our first venue in New York. But we both moved to London and ended up opening there. D.C. came almost accidentally, from making natural connections in the city…and now we have the local partners we needed to make something happen in New York.”

While cocktails take center stage, Seed Library does offer a beer and wine list, which Chetiyawardana says will evolve as the bar settles into its New York digs and learns what locals like. The food menu includes items such as whipped feta with salsa verde and crispy naan, seasonal crudités, oysters and chocolate chip cookies. A burger with aged English cheddar, gherkin and bacon on a potato roll and tater tots loaded with pancetta, pecorino and spicy herb aioli capture Seed Library’s high-low feel—comfortable, but just a little fancy.

That very contrast encapsulates Chetiyawardana’s goal with New York’s Seed Library: To exist in the overlap of the city’s cocktail bar Venn diagram, both glitzy and laid-back. It’s an especially important balance to nail in a hotel—how do you appeal to jetsetters breezing through town and looking to be wowed by a cocktail, but also build a loyal crowd of locals?

“We’re going to piggyback on the hospitality a hotel provides,” Chetiyawardana says. For him, the beauty of a hotel bar is the international crowd you’ll mingle with, but the world’s best hotel bars remember their communities, as well. By simultaneously embracing a touch of shock and awe while maintaining quality and comfort, a hotel bar becomes its own destination. “We try to welcome everybody,” he says, “whether you’re into the weird and wonderful stuff we do from a technical perspective, or you just want a gin and tonic, which we still put so much into making.”