I had a phone call this summer with a bombastic real estate agent who specializes in 9-figure Hamptons properties. She shouted at me that “everyone was already gone” because Florida schools start early and there was nothing left to write about. Ma’am, I beg to differ: September is the most sumptuous month in the Hamptons, and attracts a different kind of crowd. After Tumbleweed Tuesday, it’s our time.
I know multiple people from out of state who rent houses in September out east. If you don’t have kids in school, that’s the hack: Prices dip by over 50%, dew points reach perfection, and you can actually get into the seasonal restaurants which stay open. Keep that pool heated, and it’s an endless summer into October.
It was delightful meeting so many of you at my talk this week at The Hedges Inn with moderator Crystal Meers (a Daily Candy OG), Victoria Wolff of Our Amagansett House (whom I profiled this January for the Times), and Carson Griffith from Rich People Shit. In the Q&A, a dapper gentleman asked what the heck was going on at Sag Harbor’s The Corner, which stalled after The Clam Bar’s John and Kelly Piccininni’s friends-and-family soft opening. The following day, the Piccinninis announced that they would be “parting ways” with the Hildreth Real Estate Investors group, which owns the property. “The parties’ visions for The Corner were not aligned,” said the Piccinninis in a statement. Hildredth still plans to bring a business in by Spring 2027, if not sooner. Locals are looking forward to another spot with $58 cacio e pepe.
In today’s free newsletter, so many Bills: a Clinton dosa fetish; a baseball card mints a child millionaire; a Hamptons Ten questionnaire with interior designer to the stars Billy Cotton, and a summer recap with Sag Harbor Tavern’s Billy Durney.
What Everyone’s Talking About
Bill Clinton loves Hampton Chutney as much as the rest of us. The vegan-ish former president was spotted by pap Elder Ordonez having a dosa with a friend in East Hampton after his 80th-birthday bash at Alex Soros’s house. The Clintons have been Hampton Chutney fans since at least 2015, when Annie Karni wrote about them enjoying the hippie lunch spot in its previous Amagansett location. Humanizing.
A dad bought his son a $515 collector set of 80 baseball cards at East Hampton’s CardVault by Tom Brady shop while his son was at camp. (That alone illustrates typical Hamptons parenting style.) Then one of the cards—the 2026 Topps Chrome Baseball Shohei Ohtani & Aaron Judge 1/1 Dual Gold Logoman Autograph, whatever that means—estimated to be worth over $5 million. Great PR for CardVault, which is trumpeting it as a “historic hit.”
White’s Apothecary, the Hamptons’ go-to fancy pharmacy, is headed to Palm Beach. It’ll take over the retail for the Green’s Pharmacy and Luncheonette space down south. This is the latest Hamptons biz to become a snowbird: BuddhaBerry is opening in West Palm Beach this fall.
A tragedy unfolded this week on Shelter Island, where 38-year-old triathlete and father of two Spencer Korwin drowned while vacationing with his family at the Pridwin Hotel. The wellness entrepreneur entered the water off the hotel’s dock in the morning, police said, and was found underwater near the same dock that afternoon in an apparent accidental drowning.
Billy Cotton’s Beyoncé Fixation
If I could afford an elite interior designer, I’d want to work with Billy Cotton. His work is rich and inventive yet somehow spare. He’s a favorite of artists like Lisa Yuskavage and Cindy Sherman. He designed the Lily Allen and David Harbour Brooklyn townhouse that made its way into the title track of her breakup album, West End Girl (“Billy Cotton got sorted / All the furniture ordered”). Cotton shares a place in Springs with his partner Aaron Cator, an art expert at Freeman’s Auctions. In his Hamptons Ten questionnaire, Billy derides Hamptons lobster rolls and scented candles, and tries to manifest a friendship with Beyoncé.
Describe your perfect Hamptons day.
Tennis with Gabriel at Sportime Amagansett, Balsam Farms for vegetables, Stuart’s Seafood for fish. Lunch at home, Two Mile Hollow Beach for as long as possible, in the ocean for as long as possible. Repeat lunch at dinner with more friends.
What’s your favorite spot for a drink?
Wiborg Beach at sunset.
What’s your secret shopping spot?
He doesn’t want me to give out his number. But get the Springs “fish man”’s number. He alerts when his friends have a great catch.
Who would you love to bump into at the farmer’s market?
Beyoncé.
What’s your main gripe about the Hamptons?
People griping about the Hamptons.
What would be your dream dinner: spot, order, company?
My dinner table, striped bass freshly caught, vegetables from a local farm, Beyoncé.
What’s your advice to newbies about a visit out East?
Limit your time in restaurants, limit your traveling to other towns, and go to the beach and in the ocean every day. Eat the vegetables.
Where do you go in the Hamptons to be alone?
My TV room.
What’s your go-to gift for hosts/hostesses?
Anything that’s not a scented candle.
Who makes the best lobster roll?
I am from New England: You do not eat lobster rolls in the Hamptons.
What’s the perfect book to read in the Hamptons?
“The Rules Do Not Apply” by Ariel Levy.
Who should fill out this questionnaire next?
Beyoncé.
Burger King
When Billy Durney, the Brooklyn restaurateur behind Red Hook Tavern, opened Sag Harbor Tavern in 2024, he hoped to stay open year-round. But as many East-End entrepreneurs have learned the hard way, staffing and demand become painful in winter months. The restaurant, which operates out of the still-active American Legion, lost $70,000 in its first December. Now it’s closed from October to April.
When I sat down with Billy this week on the patio outside his restaurant, the genial, tattooed chef talks about how he would love to retire in Sag Harbor, cooking in the back of the restaurant in the fall and winter instead of bopping around his restaurant empire (He also runs Hometown Bar-B-Que locations in Brooklyn and Miami).
Billy, whose grandmother was a WWII nurse honored at the Brooklyn Legion, is gung-ho about the Legion connection. “If we were ever able to buy this real estate, that would be the greatest thing in the world,” he says. “I would stay all year-round. And we would of course give the Legion an infinity lease.”
September is Billy’s favorite month out east, so he wanted to host a “Billy and Friends” event with some of his chef pals just as the air started to crisp. The first “Billy and Friends” took place in 2018 at the James Beard House and included Mark Iacono of Lucali and Missy Robbins of Lilia. This week, he invited Charlie Mitchell of Saga, Jason Stanhope of Sullivan’s Fish Camp, Trigg Brown of Win Son, and Grant Reynolds of Parcelle Wine Group. They collaborated on a menu that included raw Carolina shrimp and melting chicken wontons.
This week’s “Billy and Friends” was presented by Chase Sapphire, which has been riding the trend for exclusive dining experiences. The fashion-friendly Sapphire, hawked by Hailey Bieber in its ads, offers cardholders the ability to book events like this one. It’s been following the money to the Hamptons, bringing Los Angeles supper club Delilah to Montauk for two years running.
For Billy, it was an opportunity to bring his chef friends, two of whom stayed at his rental, to Sag Harbor. He took them on a boat day, and they ate lunch at Duryea’s in Orient. “I don’t want to cook alone,” he says.
[Disclosure: I am not a Chase Sapphire member. I was invited by its press team to the restaurant to try the food. I was, however, one of the few paying customers who went to Sag Harbor Tavern in December 2024.]
Before you go, do check out Julia Rothman’s lovely illustrated essay for The New Yorker about her time at the Folly Tree Arboretum’s residency, one of The Hamptons’ oddest and most wonderful spots.
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That real estate agent is exactly what’s wrong out east…how’s 1985 treating them. 🤦🏻♀️
$58 cacio e pepe :( :(
This Corner thing is really such a bummer. Taking a beloved community gathering place/watering hole and turning it into an item on a P&L. Sigh.