Photo: Nicole Freezer Rubens

New York is in full summer swing — from private museum tours and rooftop cocktails to giant hot dogs in Times Square, a record‑breaking Restaurant Week, waterfront escapes on Long Island, a sweeping Costume Institute exhibition, and a fiercely feminist new play storming into Soho. It’s the kind of midsummer moment when the city feels impossibly alive, overflowing with art, food, and theater. If you join our NYC Insider’s Club, you’ll experience even more delightful surprises that make being a New Yorker feel like a privilege.

Your Invitation to Join the Most Club in Town

It’s hard to believe it’s been nearly a year since we relaunched our NYC Insider’s Club — and what a year of fun and adventure it’s been. Just this week, we enjoyed a private tour of the new Stuart Weitzman Shoe Museum at the New-York Historical Society. Next week we’re off to see Schmigadoon, and in August you’ll find us on a rooftop sipping cocktails and taking in those fabulous city views. GET THE DETAILS> 

Return of the Giant Hot Dog

Times Square’s most delightfully over‑the‑top summer installation is back: “Hot Dog: The Second Serving” by Brooklyn artists Jen Catron and Paul Outlaw returns July 21–August 8, 2026, stretching its 65‑foot frankfurter across Duffy Square. With its oversized bun, mustard streak, and daily hydraulic confetti blasts, the sculpture brings humor, spectacle, and a wink at American excess during the country’s 250th anniversary. It’s bold, absurd, and impossible to ignore — exactly the kind of public art moment that makes Times Square feel electric in midsummer.

The project is presented by Times Square Arts, the public art program of the Times Square Alliance, which commissions ambitious, accessible works that interrupt the district’s nonstop commercial energy with creativity and cultural commentary. Their installations transform one of the world’s busiest public spaces into an open‑air gallery, inviting millions of passersby to engage with contemporary art in unexpected ways. You can explore more of their programming at Times Square Arts.

Summer Restaurant Week is Back

NYC Restaurant Week Summer  is shaping up to be one of the city’s most vibrant culinary celebrations yet. Running July 20 through August 16, the program brings together hundreds of restaurants across all five boroughs, each offering prix‑fixe lunch and dinner menus at $30, $45, or $60. It’s a moment when New York’s dining scene throws its doors wide open — from celebrity‑chef destinations and iconic neighborhood institutions to hidden gems you only discover by wandering a few extra blocks. The energy of midsummer adds its own sparkle: outdoor tables buzzing, new seasonal menus, and that unmistakable feeling that the city is showing off.

What makes 2026 especially exciting is the sheer breadth of participating spots — more than 600 restaurants, spanning Italian trattorias, sleek steakhouses, inventive Asian fusion kitchens, sushi counters, Brazilian tables, and classic New York pubs. Whether you’re planning a date night, exploring a new neighborhood, or simply indulging in a midday escape, Restaurant Week is designed to make the city feel deliciously accessible. Reservations opened July 14, and as always, the most coveted tables go fast. It’s a perfect excuse to try something new, revisit a favorite, or build a mini culinary tour across the boroughs — the kind of summer tradition only New York can pull off. BROWSE ALL THE PARTICIPATING RESTAURANTS.

Spotlight on Long Island: More Waterfront Dining

Dining by the water on Long Island is more than a meal — it’s a moment. As tides drift and sunlight dances across the shoreline, conversations ease and the island’s natural beauty takes center stage. With exceptional waterfront restaurants in every direction, great food and unforgettable views are always close by. This week, reporter Andrea Peponakis highlights four more gems worth the trip.GET THE DETAILS> 

Roving in the Costume Art

Nicole Freezer Rubins writes:

Dressing one’s body is an intimate affair involving form, function and creativity. Costume Art at the Metropolitan Museum explores the history of this universal concept throughout time, showcasing the constant connections between art and fashion. Andrew Bolton heads the Costume Institute and curated this summer’s grand exhibition. He culled 200 works of art from the museum’s renowned clothing archives and paired them with paintings, drawings, and sculptures from their vast collection, spanning prehistoric to present day.

The show is arranged into a series of body types: the abstracted, aging, disabled, large and mortal. The selected artists and designers showcased include Vincent Van Gogh, Yayoi Kusama, Pablo Picasso, and Henri Matisse, Thom Browne, Loewe, Schiaparelli, and Alexander McQueen, merging the finest in their fields. This dynamic show is open through January 10. It is a visually cunning way to further connect people to art across time and place. GET ALL THE DETAILS.  

A Darkly Funny and Fiercely Feminist New Play

One of the many things we love about NYC is live theater everywhere, and you’re going to want to head to the Soho Playhouse to see HUNGRY WOMEN, the darkly funny and fiercely feminist new play by Melissa Maney, which storms into Soho Playhouse this summer as a winner of the venue’s prestigious Lighthouse Series. Directed by Daniella Caggiano and led by Tony Award nominee Julia Lester, the production unfolds across three eras spanning two hundred years, imagining a matriarchal society born the moment men vanish—devoured, in fact. With biting humor and a macabre wink, the play explores power, gender, survival, sexuality, and the delicious possibilities that emerge when the patriarchy is literally consumed. Performances run July 23–August 30, 2026, with Opening Night on July 25 at 7 p.m. at Soho Playhouse.

Presented by Black Watch Theatre, the world premiere features Lester alongside Zoe Dean, Mariyea, and Sophie Zmorrod in a sharp, unapologetic examination of what women might build—and hunger for—when freed from centuries of constraint. Following the success of the Off-Broadway hit The Trouble With Dead Boyfriends, the company returns with a bold new work that blends absurdism and the macabre through a distinctly feminist lens. Tickets, priced $44–$69, are now available at SohoPlayhouse.com for this six‑week limited engagement. GET YOUR TICKETS.