Jean-Georges Vongerichten arrived in New York in 1986, working at Lafayette restaurant in the Drake Swissôtel for five years before opening the quaint JoJo on the Upper East Side. By the time he launched his namesake eatery in 1997, he was already a much-lauded fixture in the New York food scene, celebrated for his fresh take on modern French cuisine (for which he earned three Michelin stars).
It helps that the French-born Vongerichten has no reservations when it comes to building his industry gamechanging food empire. From Spice Market to Perry St and ABC Kitchen, the intrepid chef is responsible for helping to redefine a fickle industry, simply by being malleable. “If one meal is a failure, you change it. It’s only food. You can correct things and make it better.”
“I was never worried,” he continues. “I knew as a restaurateur I could always get a chef job somewhere else. There were jobs out there, and it makes you a little more fearless. You take more risks.” He now oversees 12 restaurants in New York and 38 around the world. Most notable is the recently opened AbcV, a fast-casual vegetarian concept located in New York’s Flatiron District. The impetus for the plant-based eatery was to explore how people will consume food in the future. “It takes two weeks to grow a radish and two years to grow a steak,” he explains. “It sums up what it will be like in the next 20 years.”
His restaurants are immersed in bespoke moments. From the silverware to the lighting, the idiosyncratic qualities throughout are due to a collaborative spirit, so far counting Rockwell Group, Yabu Pushelberg, Adam Tihany, Herzog & de Meuron, and Ian Schrager as partners. He’s currently working alongside Lord Norman Foster of Foster + Partners on the architect’s first restaurant project, which will crown the 59th and 60th floors of the Four Seasons Hotel Philadelphia in the Comcast Technology Center. The cityscape will play a prominent role thanks to expansive windows and reflective tilted mirrors along the ceiling.
Though much has changed for Vongerichten since growing up in Alsace, France helping his mother and grandmother cook lunch for his father’s nearly 50 employees, he champions a humble approach to food, business, and life. He starts his day at 8 a.m. at the gym and then heads to his office. Here, he’s a businessman, paying bills until he makes his way to Jean-Georges, where he spends six hours cooking every day. “It keeps me sane,” he says. At 16, when he dropped out of school to apprentice at Auberge de l’Ill restaurant, he didn’t realize “you could make a living in food.” And now, despite all his success, “At the end of the day, I’m just a cook. I can’t lose my craft or I’m nothing. My best tools are my hands and my palate.”
