The Mercer

Our holiday decorations are up and giving that cozy vibe.

You asked, we delivered. More Mercer!

You asked, we delivered. More Mercer.

We have a few of Hirschfeld’s framed prints in the restaurant. Guests always inquire, so we thought we would share a bit about the artist:

Al Hirschfeld is renowned for his iconic black-and-white caricatures of celebrities, especially Broadway and Hollywood stars. Hirschfeld is known for hiding Nina’s name, written in capital letters (“NINA”), in most of the drawings he produced after her birth.

The name would appear in a sleeve, in a hairdo, or somewhere in the background. As Margo Feiden described it, Hirschfeld engaged in the “harmless insanity,” as he called it, of hiding her name at least once in each of his drawings. The number of NINAs concealed is shown by the number written to the right of his signature.

Generally, if no number is to be found, either NINA appears once or the drawing was completed before she was born.

For the first few months after Nina’s birth, Hirschfeld intended the hidden NINAs to appeal to his circle of friends. But what he had not realized was that the population at large was beginning to spot them, too. When Hirschfeld thought that the gag was wearing thin among his friends and stopped concealing NINAs in his drawings, letters to The New York Times ranging from “curious” to “furious” pressured him to begin hiding them again. He said it was easier to hide the NINAs than it was to answer all the mail. From time to time he lamented that the gimmick had overshadowed his art.

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Honor the holiday!