Marc Murphy is the chef and co-owner of Tribeca staple Landmarc, Ditch Plains in the West Village and UWS, and a new Landmarc in the Time Warner Center.

The son of a diplomat, Murphy spent much of his youth on the move, living in places like France and Italy. After landing in New York after high school, he held down odd jobs, attended the Institute of Culinary Education, and worked as a line cook at Terrance Brennan and Andrew Silverman's Prix Fixe. His initial brush with fame came in 1997 when he became executive chef of Cellar in the Sky, the restaurant atop the World Trade Center. He moved on to head up the kitchen at the now-shuttered Upper West Side French spot La Fourchette, earning glowing write-ups for his old-school French cooking; he followed up with a rare dud in 2000 with the Park Avenue Asian fusion restaurant Chinoiserie.

Murphy went out on his own in 2004 when, with his wife Pamela Schein, he opened the oenophile-centric Landmarc. The Tribeca restaurant quickly became a neighborhood institution, winning praise for its well-curated and unusually affordable collection of wines. The Murphys followed up in late 2006 with Ditch Plains, a Hamptons-themed seafood spot on Bedford Street. Alas, a recent attempt to replicate Landmarc's success didn't turn out as expected. In 2007, they opened an "inferior" version of Landmarc in the Time Warner Center and have since opened a second Ditch Plains on the Upper West Side. [Image via Getty]