Despite my best intentions to cool it, I find myself at a dining hotspot of the moment on most New York visits. It’s a natural routine, cycling through staples before getting Resy-addled and trying one new, buzzy opening.
A simple reason for this is personal competitiveness, a reluctance to accept an inability to work my way into a room. The other: When this kind of thing hits, there’s nothing like it. Maybe you’re witnessing a head chef debuting their food for the first time. Maybe it’s a follow-up effort from a proven superstar group.
At least one piece of the puzzle usually is askew. The timing between apps and mains drags. The service is stilted. The desserts are too clever by half. It’s the natural order of a restaurant finding its stride. But, man, sometimes it’s just magic. My friends still rave about rushing to Bridges during its opening six weeks. There was The Chelsea’s reopening, especially the dapper Lobby Bar for a solid three-month stretch. The intimacy of candles flickering across wood on opening night at Wilde’s, or the playground laboratory feel of Baby Bistro’s early days. The stroll down Commerce Street and through the sets of drapes into the hum of Wild Cherry last October.
There is an allure to getting through the gatekeeping, and a charm in witnessing a restaurant while its identity is still forming. The other thing that’s pretty consistent in these fleetingly exclusive spaces: Hot, well-dressed people enjoying good food.
“An age-old question,” says Arden Shore, Editor in Chief at The Infatuation. “Where to see and be seen, where to SABS.”
Vibes define a restaurant — especially a restaurant where you sit down and order from a waiter — as much as, if not more than, the dishes. The crowd matters. And, increasingly, the crowds are torched.
Consider a recent return to Wild Cherry this summer. Seated in a corner two-top, I spent half the meal enjoying a parade of seafood and pasta with a friend, and the other half side-eyeing a man in a schlubby T, basketball shorts and raggedy flip-flops, manspreading across a shared banquette. At one point, he lifted his leg up to table level to show his companion something on his foot. My friend jolted her head back, spotting toes within striking distance of our oysters. The man turned his head, said sorry, and then kept his foot up to continue his demonstration.
Perusing the dining room, you saw the aftermath of a restaurant reaching its algorithmic escape velocity. Eight months ago, in the shift from soft opening to wide release, this space was primarily occupied by two cohorts:
Friends of the Frenchette restaurant group, invited to dine early
Hot, well-dressed, in-the-know New Yorkers ready to make the meal a kind of occasion
As any restaurant crests out of that phase where it holds slightly more power over who fills its seats, it also relinquishes some vibe regulation. You can rethink the technique behind your flat tuna crudo. You mostly have to accept elastic waistbands, obnoxious banter and bad footwear.
And here’s the tension: Early success begets TikTok clips and must-visit lists that turn admission into a badge of honor. More people wait their way inside. And once everyone hears that a place offers great food and a hot room, the crowd arriving for that promise starts to make the room less hot.
You don’t only find this at new restaurants.
“I don’t know, the vibe has been weird tonight,” said a friend working at Demo when we popped in for drinks and dessert following our Wild Cherry Send Help blunder. I looked around. This eclectic West Village wine bar is a bit more of an industry destination. The crowd never looks fancy, but there’s an intentional, effortless confidence behind the folks that come here for beef tongue with tonnato or mackerel and gribiche. The same goes for their style. It’s a hot room. But not tonight.
Another staffer revealed what was up: There was a credit card-backed promotion running, attracting a broader neighborhood sect popping in for 45 minutes, claiming their points, and bouncing. The bad sneakers, sweatpants and matching cheap polka-dot made more sense.
I think our dessert was good. I don’t really remember. We didn’t stay long. While Demo is a spot to linger, this was a different Demo. The worst place you can have dinner in New York is anywhere that you’re the hottest people in the room.
After that night, I started posing this question to industry friends and reputable diners:
If you wanted to eat good food at a restaurant surrounded by hot, well-dressed people, where would you go?
I got a lot of, “Oh. Uh, nowhere … I’ve got nothing.” People were stumped trying to land all of the qualifiers. They knew where to eat well. They knew where they’d find hot people in good clothes. But one dining room where you could get it all?
“It’s actually a hard question,” said The Angel’s Emily Wilson, after adding, “This is the most you text I’ve ever received.”
She was right. No one was surprised to hear I was pushing this poll. I love food and I love restaurants, but I especially love a great, all-encompassing restaurant vibe with food to match. And if the food is good, why does it matter if the people around you are checked out and wearing horrible pants?
“It’s distracting,” said one downtown server.
Yes, exactly. It’s distracting. When you’ve made the choice to dine well, to dine extravagantly or indulgently or just to dine out at all, a bad crowd is intrusive.
In the middle of the Le Veau d’Or dining room, chef Riad Nasr stood next to me assessing the scene. “Fun room tonight,” he said, satisfied.
Le Veau doesn’t always deliver on the hot and well-dressed front, but it often does. Its price point, uptown location and proclivity to regulars helps. I could hear in Riad’s voice that he values and feels the vibe when it’s right, just like his diners do. He needs his team to cook the duck and cherries to perfection, but he also needs the space to fucking bump like it did on this Wednesday.
There’s a comfort that comes in looking and feeling good, in getting a fit off for yourself and whomever you’re dining with. It’s different from the comfort of treating this gem on East 60th Street like an extension of your living room. Judging people for falling short on fashion trends or pilates sessions is mean-spirited. But I want the people with whom I share a dining room to bring the same level of care and consideration to where they eat with how they eat and how they carry themselves.
If you try hard enough, you can eat at basically any restaurant. An IG post from a tough table is our country’s most accessible status symbol. The real trend here is an increase in people acting like the work is done once they hit book at 12:01 am. They don’t approach this difficult-to-book table with a sense of romance or intentionality. They wear whatever is around, and order whatever they’ve read is good. If the meal falls flat, it might be because, well, flat is all they know.
It’s not exclusively a resource issue. Look at the tech elite attending Sun Valley, captured well here by Jacob Gallagher. You’ve either got the same embrace of pure, indulgent comfort you see across dining rooms, or status-chasing conformity. Notion’s Ivan Zhao gets NYT’s headline spot for eschewing both, rocking an excellent suit that says, “I thought about this, I care, and I’m glad I look good.”
A few folks I talked to zeroed in on places that reliably bring it on all fronts, including:
Multiple votes for Bridges. Says Ally Laukhuf: “Last time I ate at the bar with a girlfriend we befriended the couple next to us and they bought our dinner. I know what that sounds like but swear it was good, clean fun :)”
Upscale date destinations: “I feel like I’m more typically sitting next to groups of identical businessmen at a steakhouse, but I once saw one of the most beautiful and elegant women I’ve ever seen on a date at The Grill,” says Biz Sherbert. “I personally really enjoy the people-watching at swanky date spots.”
Derek C. Blasberg asks: “Do the hotties still go to Lucien? Or am I showing my age here?” (Sources confirmed that they do.)
Bars with food, as Audrey Horne wrote: “In New York, I see the hottest people at bars more than restaurants. I feel elevated anytime I go to Swan Room at Nine Orchard or Bemelmans Bar at The Carlyle, because the setting at both encourages good dress. For more casual spots, Lucien, Bar Oliver, and Colbo Next Door are almost always filled with hot people.” MK Hennelly backed that up with Clemente Bar. “Shit’s so fire. Everyone is sexy and mean. I am at home there.”
Olivia Weiss, speaking the truth: “I think the answer is really Superiority Burger but you have to get down with the freaks.”
Arden Shore identified the power of a single restaurant group: “A foolproof NYC move will always be Hart’s/Cervo’s/Fly/Eel Bar. Those guys know what they’re doing, but you probably know that already. My more spontaneous ‘what if…?’ place to look good and look around is Bunny in Bed-Stuy.”
Maritza Lerman Yoes was the only person to invoke the Bay: “In San Francisco, my idea of hot is a bygone era of old school intellectual aristocracy (horn-rimmed glasses and grey bobs), so I’d say Spruce or Chez Panisse.” Agreed. I’ve had many meals in SF, and have only sat next to a hot, well-dressed stranger at Chez Panisse. Is there any hope for our country’s center of power, innovation and wealth?
Okay, then there’s whatever the hell is going on in Los Angeles, best encapsulated by these three quotes:
“My life in LA is so boring and lacking all of this.”
“Without Horses, we don’t have much.”
“This is why my dating life has become non-existent.”
There were reluctant votes for Chateau Marmont (is the food here anything more than tolerable?) and Sunset Tower (well, there are the fries). Arden stands by Jones: “In LA, it’ll always be Jones. Call the day before and ask for a booth.” Carving Block’s Hannah Reed added RVR, Bar di Bello and Alba. (The judging panel determined Ètra is disqualified because most of the hotness can be attributed to their staff).
It turns out there’s only one great answer in LA right now, and that came via Jason Stewart: LA Grocery & Cafe. The Melrose Hill grocery store threads the delicate needle of carrying very, very good food while never elevating into such a TikTok destination that it gets overrun by current or future Disney adults. The customers here are either wearing real, well-fitting clothes or high-quality athleisure like H-O-R-S-E. They shop with a little swag and plenty of confidence.
Respondents recognizing no time-of-day constraints had an easier time. Weekday lunch at All Time or breakfast at Raf’s were common, accurate answers. Richelle Rice chose Lovely Day, across from Elizabeth Street Garden. Everyone in Europe also was less troubled by the question. “It’s insane how many beautiful people are in Europe everywhere,” one said. Alex Heath initially told me he felt under-qualified, then took it back once he went to the vinyl-filled Pharaoh in Athens. Ben Butler submitted Shankeys, an Indian-Irish restaurant in an old Hackney betting shop. “More well dressed in a Brooklyn way than fancy.”
Then, finally, a breakthrough answer began to emerge: Roman’s in Fort Greene. There’s something to a specific kind of established, reliable spot for regulars in the right neighborhood. No one there is annoying. They have some money and know how to behave. Their sense of style is assured. Much like the food, the clientele know what they’re doing and they do it well. The glamor and culinary ambitions surf just below the threshold that would thrust it into vibe-killing destination status.
You might have your own version of this restaurant. It’s where you take friends who are visiting. It’s where you book after a long trip. You might take your parents. (It depends on your parents.) You nod at the bartenders upon arrival and flirt with the waiters who remember you prefer sparkling. You switch seamlessly between dining at the bar or a table. You notice when they rotate one seasonal dish for another. You’re comfortable giving feedback and they’re comfortable hearing it. The food is always very good and sometimes one or two things are great.
That’s how all of the real restaurant alchemy comes together. How a bunch of hot, confident, intentional yet spontaneous, well-dressed people end up in one room, sharing a meal and forcing a space to come to life. Making memories that go well beyond the plating style or sauce work behind any one dish you see on an Instagram story. It’s a mutual thing. The restaurant settles in and delivers every day. The crowd follows suit.
honoured to be officially recognised as a reputable diner
I felt like this recently at the Big 4 in SF, even the older clientele were cool and hot. But they are recently reopened