Restaurant and nightlife impresario Rich Wolf isn’t motivated to open a single simple restaurant. His mantra—along with his TAO Group partners Noah Tepperberg, Jason Strauss, and Marc Packer—is to do “next-level shit,” he says. “Every time we do something, we try to raise it to that level.”
Take, for instance, the fact that TAO Group—which operates roughly 25 venues in New York, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, and Sydney—has partnered with the Madison Square Garden Company (MSG). A perfect strategic relationship, says Wolf, because of the company’s access to talent and sponsorships, extensive infrastructure and contacts, ticketing platforms, and a think tank of internal people. “We’ve got a lot on the table. We’ve got a lot of plans,” he says of looking for the right company to join forces with. “We decided that MSG was really the only company that had a similar culture and that we could mesh well with.”
Those plans include the recent opening of four venues on one city block—including signature brands TAO, Beauty & Essex, and Avenue nightclub, as well as new concept Luchini Pizzeria & Bar—in West Hollywood in March. Still to come are a lobby lounge and the Highlight Room, an 11,000-square-foot restaurant-club-pool rooftop hybrid, at the soon-to-open Dream Hotel, situated in the same complex. TAO Group’s mega LA debut is the first time they have put this many brands in one space. “We’ve basically created an enclave,” explains Wolf, adding that an alleyway connects the spaces. “Guests don’t really have to leave the premises.”
A 20-foot-tall, 3D-animated Quan Yin statue welcomes guests to TAO Los Angeles; photo by Warren Jagger
Longtime collaborator Rockwell Group reimagined all the venues for the West Coast. “You’ll see a language and certain things I refer to as the greatest hits from the other venues in New York and Las Vegas, but each will have its own personality.” There’s the pawnshop entrance, grand staircase, and a locket-wrapped dining room at Beauty & Essex. At the two-story TAO, complete with an original wood bow truss ceiling, another 20-foot-tall Quan Yin statue standing above a koi pond comes to life thanks to animations from 3D projection mapping.
Still on the docket: a second Stanton Social restaurant in New York (a follow-up to the shared plate restaurant on the Lower East Side with a design by Josh Held); a TAO restaurant and nightclub in an iconic building in Chicago by Rockwell Group; three venues (including a Lavo from ICRAVE) at the Marina Bay Sands in Singapore; and multiple new F&B spaces at the upcoming Moxy Times Square (also by Rockwell Group). “With the growth of our brands, we have to expand our guest base as well, especially the 20-somethings, cultivating the next generation,” he says of their decision to team up with Marriott’s millennial-focused brand.
Beauty & Essex Los Angeles; photo by Warren Jagger
In the ever-evolving restaurant and nightclub world, the TAO Group venues are celebrity magnets, rank on top 10 highest-grossing lists each year (with the waitlists and long lines to match), and continue to outdo themselves years after opening—17 years later, the original TAO in Midtown New York still turns four covers a night.
Wolf credits their longevity for two reasons. One, “we haven’t overexposed ourselves. [Almost two decades later], we just opened our fourth TAO in our third city. It is still special.” And two, where others say “location, location, location,” he explains, “for us, it’s about hospitality, hospitality, hospitality. If you deliver hospitality, you can never, ever lose.” That also means taking care of TAO Group team members as family, “and it’s everybody’s job to take care of the guest.”
The challenge, he says, is maintaining the quality TAO Group is known for as they grow and “not miss a beat,” he says. “We always push ourselves because we’re all creative people at heart. And we’re blessed in that people come to us to have fun.”
