Richard Zampella: Owner & Operator of Skipperdee's

Richard Zampella: Owner & Operator of Skipperdee's in Point Lookout, NY

Richard Zampella has worked in the hospitality industry for over 30 years. He has managed the Oak Room at the Plaza Hotel and served as Food & Beverage Manager of the The Essex House Hotel on Central Park South. For 15 years he work 65 floors high atop Rockefeller Center at the Rainbow Room under legendary restauranteur Joe Baum. In 2010, he created the concept and design for Skipperdee’s Ice Cream Shop in the seaside hamlet of Point Lookout, NY.

Richard Zampella is also a restaurant designer that created the interiors and exterior of Brixx & Barley Restaurant in Long Beach NY. He is also responsible for the bar design for Heneghan’s Tavern in Point Lookout, NY as well as the tavern’s website.

In 2013 Zampella receive a Critics’ Pic from the New York Times as producer for the feature documentary Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen which is narrated by Sam Waterston. The film is currently available on DVD at Walmart, Best Buy and Target.

Visit Website: Skipperdee's

Richard Zampella Recalls The Rainbow Room

Richard Zampella pictured in The Rainbow Room for Gourmet Magazine 

Richard Zampella Recalls The Rainbow Room

After the Rainbow Room had been reopened in 1986, a guest asked restauranteur Joeseph Baum how he had managed to improve the views so dramatically from the 65th Floor of the GE building. He told her that he had lifted all the Rivers and Bridges. Baum would later recall, "She seemed to be satisfied with that answer."

Joe was fascinated with all the great urban spaces in New York City where people gather together. He viewed them as market places of ideas serving a similar function to the Forum in ancient Rome. It was not surprising that one of his first projects; The Newarker, situated in the vast airport terminal at Liberty International, became his warm up exercise for a fast succession of spectacular restaurants with hospitality projects that soured above the bustling city plazas of the former World Trade Center and Rockefeller Center.

Baum's genius lay in the simple premise that it is the combination of ambiance, food and service that defines a great restaurant. He went far beyond the traditional ways of creating and running restaurants when he integrated the services and skills of fashion designers, acoustical and efficiency experts and consultants, including James Beard and Julia Child, but the part he enjoyed most was working with architects and graphic designers. Among his many colleagues were Philip Johnson. Warren Platner, Eero Saarinen, I. M. Pei, Mies van de Rohe, Alexander Girard, William Pahlmann, Philip George,
Hugh Hardy and Milton Glaser.

From the beginning, Joe knew architecture held the secret to realizing his vivid and revolutionary concepts. It was pivotal to his dreams- He was drawn to architects and designers whose intellect and cultural depths grabbed his ideas and were willing to wrestle with outmoded rules and blinkered thinking.

Richard Zampella will always remember the Rainbow Room fondly where he worked from 1989-2003
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Richard Zampella Restaurant Design Portfolio Now on Tumblr

Richard Zampella’s food service career spans nearly three decades, most of them spent at a fifteen year stint at The Rainbow Room in Rockefeller Center under restaurant impresario Joseph Baum. Zampella’s career began in 1987 when he began his career as Dining Room Manager at The Oyster Bar in Grand Central under Jerome Brody and Mario Staub.

Subsequently, Zampella managed Thee Oak Room and Bar at The Plaza Hotel where he caught the attention of Atif Youssef, then Vice President of Sheraton Hotels, who recruited Zampella to serve as a Food & Beverage Manager at The Essex House Hotel on Central Park South.

In 2001, Zampella parlayed his expertise to found Zampella & Company, a collaborative team of hospitality experts that consults and develops restaurant concepts in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

When not consulting or lecturing on hospitality subjects, Zampella serves as the Managing Partner of Transmultimedia, Inc., a creative services agency with offices in New York City and on Long Island which recently produced the feature length documentary, Cooper & Hemingway: The True Gen.  The film focuses on 20 year friendship between writer Ernest Hemingway and actor Gary Cooper. and received a Critic’s Pick from The New York Times in October of 2013. Zampella supports many non-for-profit organizations and serves as President of the Point Lookout Chamber of Commerce in Nassau County.

View Richard Zampella Restaurant Portfolio