Laetitia and Arthur Cohen: the couple behind Paris’s coolest Franco-Japanese restaurants

0:12Arthur Cohen:Hello and welcome to the Monaco Weekly. I am Fernando Augusto Pacheco and this week we speak with couple Leticia and Arthur Cohen, restaurateurs in Paris for incredible places like Baromi, Oji and more. It was a pleasure to speak with them about their expansion plans and great Japanese food.

0:36Arthur Cohen:Arthur Cohen and Leticia Cohen, welcome to Monaco Radio. What a pleasure talking to you guys because I love your restaurants. I've just tried a few days ago in Paris. And my first question, perhaps to both of you, both restaurateurs, what's your connection with Japan? Because the three restaurants that you guys have are very much Japanese-focused, was of course a little bit of a French touch to it as well. But tell us a bit more about that connection. Long story short, it started seven years ago. I was in finance actually, working for restaurators, advising restaurators, and I wanted to shift toward this industry that I love so much.

1:16Arthur Cohen:I had like always this crazy obsession about Japan. It was really like a global obsession. It was around the culture, not only around the food, around the architecture, around the design. it's about their global approach to the products actually how to perfect the products how to craft the products in the best way possible and how to pay attention to every detail we went to a trip in Tokyo with our other partner Olivier Leon we came back with the idea of opening in Izakaya that's how it started the adventure and it was here seven years ago yes with Oni-san with Onisan.

1:52Laetitia Cohen:The first restaurant we opened in the Marais.

1:55Arthur Cohen:It was an izakaya, sharing plates, beautiful sake bottles. And from then, it was just like a connection of logical, like, you know.

2:05Laetitia Cohen:Yeah, a story going on. Like after I was wanting to open a Japanese fine dining, this year is like the sushi and wine bar. So it's all about constricting a story around Japan and around all the culture that talks to us.

2:20Arthur Cohen:And I love that every restaurant has very much its DNA. You just mentioned Bar Omi's sushi and bar and orgy is a little bit more of a fine dining. So tell us more about the differences between the three restaurants. The more recent one is Bar Omi, right?

2:34Laetitia Cohen:Yeah, so we opened Bar Omi in September. And the idea was really to do like a sushi place where you could like order, not like an omakase style, but really à la carte and have like a unique place where you could have your wines.

2:52Arthur Cohen:So the idea, long story short, when we started, we met with the sommelier. Everything started with a sommelier that we love called Jérémy. His nickname is Champignon. And the idea was to build a cool, easy, casual restaurant built around sushi. Because as you can see in every global cities now, there is a big thing that is popping. It's around omakase, you know, which is amazing for Japanese gastronomy. It's great. But as clients, everything we do starts with something that we are missing as clients, you know.

3:27Laetitia Cohen:Something that we want to do and have as an experience.

3:31Arthur Cohen:Yeah. Like for us, either in Paris now, there were like classic sushi or omakase, but there was not in between for a nice sushi, you know,

3:41Laetitia Cohen:and with a cool ambience, young, new.

3:46Arthur Cohen:And a place where you could drink well, you know. It was important because like in sushi places, even in omakase right now, there is not a big space made to the alcohol or the craft. Right. Like the wine list in the omakase menu are super small and it's not really intended. And generally in classic sushi spot, it's more around beers or a few sake. But we were like, okay, it makes sense to come and have your nigiris and open a beautiful bourgogne that is curated through a wine list that is changing daily. So that's why Baromi, it's really like, I would say, partnership between us, Jeremy Champignon, his nickname, and our head chef, Taku, that is really giving us a special energy around food.

4:37Yeah.

4:38Laetitia Cohen:Especially last time we went to Japan, we really saw that Japanese are really sensitive to wines. More and more sensitive to wines, to natural wines, to all those different discoveries. So for us, it was also like there was some sense to do it like this way, you know.

4:56Arthur Cohen:One thing that impressed me about your restaurants as well, it's the design inside. You know, it's very slinky. There's something sexy about it. It's fun. So tell us more how, who, for example, you know, helped to the design of Borrow Me. And is it the same people from OG as well? So basically, reversing OG, OG, it was really like a special approach because it's our partner, Olivier Leon, that is an amazing creative director that really shaped the idea of this red lacquer box that is very cinematographic. To do that, we worked with another friend of ours, Will McGrose, that just launched back in the moment his studio Hypnos.

5:39Arthur Cohen:OG is really around that idea of getting into a moment where the time stops around it.

5:46Laetitia Cohen:It's really cinematographic.

5:48Arthur Cohen:Yeah, it's really eyes wide shut, Stanley Kubrick references. It's about Saint Laurent in the 70s. It's about those references from an era that define taste. And Baromi, it's still around cinema in the end. It's an architect that is great called Fanny Perrier that is really popping lately, that is working now on our newest big project that will arrive in October. and for that we taught the we called it the drawing room as you arrive and you're you know in this in this big drawing made by the artist uh de russie uh french artist de russie everything is like artwork signed and once again you know it's in the mood for a lot of idea very sleek

6:37Laetitia Cohen:very feminine and masculine in the same time yeah but for both restaurants it was really important for us to like work with a young artist this is also the what the places are about and read to create authentic places and unique restaurants you gave it away there leticia new places of

6:59Arthur Cohen:course i am curious and what is the plans for the summer i mean is there more is there more excitement to come yeah there there are too much so first in the in a month and a half we're gonna go back to Ibiza to reopen. We're doing a seasonal restaurant there with the team from Silencio.

7:17Laetitia Cohen:Yeah, for the third year.

7:19Arthur Cohen:For the third year, called Urusai.

7:20Laetitia Cohen:It's a seasonal Izakaya.

7:22Arthur Cohen:On the beach.

7:23Laetitia Cohen:On the beach.

7:24Arthur Cohen:Yeah. This is the project that is the most, like, you know, coming around the corner. So it's really fun. It's Izakaya. That is, we call it Izakaya Ibizenka. Working with the product from Ibiza with our chef from Onisa and Romain. and Benjamin. And yeah, this is going to last season. And in September, we have, actually, we have three new spots coming. Three. Yeah, three. The program is busy. We have a...

7:51Laetitia Cohen:We're going to have the sister of Baromi.

7:54Arthur Cohen:Yeah, Bar Nomo.

7:55Laetitia Cohen:Yeah, the name is going to be Bar Nomo, which is going to be a cocktail and hand roll restaurant.

8:01Arthur Cohen:Perfect.

8:01Laetitia Cohen:So it's going to be like right next to Baromi.

8:04Arthur Cohen:Yeah, but we, yeah, a lot of surprise, a lot of amazing collaborators, crazy design Taku is working around the menu and then we are doing a big place is Place du Marche St. Honoré so still in the first like literally 200 meters from Baromi again with a restaurant Tycoons in France Medi that you own Siena the star-studded place just like next to the new spot so this is it and then we are finally launching Italian bar completely different Completely different with our partners from our olive oil brand, Oleapia. This would be in a new members club. Like, yeah, it's going to be really, really fun.

8:48Laetitia Cohen:Yeah, on Place des Vouches in the Marais.

8:51Arthur Cohen:So yeah, three spots coming, two Japanese, two more, and one Italian. Italian bar. But still, you know, with that Japanese flair, like in the design and in the approach to the product. Overall, are you excited about the dining scene in Paris? because I spent the whole week in Paris. I felt, I don't know, there was something in the air in Paris. You know, I know a lot of creatives are moving to the city. I think the city is going through a very cool moment, but you guys live there. So tell me, what do you think?

9:20Laetitia Cohen:We really feel the same. There's a lot of happening in Paris, a lot of openings, hotels, boutiques, restaurants. Really, Paris is popping. There's special energy and a lot of tourists are coming back actually to Paris.

9:33Arthur Cohen:Yeah, it's crazy because we see this. I don't really know how and why Paris became such a crazy spot lately, but we just came back from the US and everybody is talking about Paris. Even in New York, they're talking about Paris. The exciting openings are in Paris right now. There are even international chains that are coming to Paris. The Maybourn is opening. Sartre Ambrose just opened. And we see this mix of luxury and cool spots working their way. Fashion-wise and design-wise, it's super big too. The scene is really, really popping and it's good for us because it's like we are like Parisian. We are working in the city.

10:15Arthur Cohen:We were born in the city. We lived abroad, but we always came back. And we love Paris. It's an obsession. Thank you, Leticia and Arthur Cohen there. And do pay a visit to one of the incredible restaurants. I'm Fernando Gustav Pacheco and the show is edited by Jack Jewers. Thank you for listening.