Her first restaurant:
“Two years later we opened Pulqueria, this Mexican restaurant next door. That was a learning curve as well, because I had never really done a restaurant before, and it's a bigger ordeal than doing a bar; just a lot of overhead and moving parts.
How The Butcher’s Daughter came to be:
“I had these two nightlife businesses for a few years. I was really yearning for something healthy, and there this was this great space around the corner from where I lived on Bowery. I would pass this great corner where the original The Butcher's Daughter is now.
“I’d been working on an idea for doing a juice bar, just thinking about it. At the time, I thought, ‘You know, no one is really doing this in the cold pressed juice market.’ It evolved while I was designing it, to be a full café as well.”
Why vibe is everything:
“I wanted to create almost like a Parisian café, but the vegetarian version. Healthy, but has that feeling like you almost want to light a cigarette out there. The cafe has a vibe and a community, a communal feeling.”
And branding, too:
“I describe myself as a designer first, and I just happened to be in the bar and restaurant industry so I am always thinking about the design first. I knew I wanted to design it like a butcher's shop with vegetables, with kale hanging from the meat hooks. I came up with Butcher's Daughter because it’s like the daughter is rebelling against her father, making a vegetarian butcher shop.”
Why it’s important to identify what’s missing:
“There are so many vegetarian spots in New York that are like hippie-dippie, with bad lighting, they don't even have a beer and wine license. You just don't want to be in there. Vegetarians have always had to sacrifice style for health. New Yorkers really responded well to it, because they just party so hard, they work hard, and they need an instant shot of health.”