Photos and interview by Stacie Joy
HAGS has made a big impression in a very small space.
Since opening at 163 First Ave. at 10th Street in 2022, chef Telly Justice and sommelier Camille Lindsley have built a devoted following with their intimate, queer-owned restaurant, known for its vegan and omnivore tasting menus, wine pairings, and pay-what-you-wish brunches.
Now, they're preparing for their next chapter.
Justice and Lindsley recently signed a lease at 334 Bowery between Bond and Great Jones, where they'll have more room to expand on the vision that has made HAGS one of the East Village's most distinctive dining destinations. (They will appear before Community Board 2 for a liquor license tomorrow evening.)
We stopped by HAGS before service on Friday to talk about the move, the design plans and what comes next.
What made you realize it was time to look for a larger space?
From left: Lindsley and Justice
Chef Telly Justice: We have been looking around for another space for a couple of years now, mainly because we know that it takes a long time. New York City commercial real estate is crazy; it's very competitive, and we like to make decisions really slowly and be very patient and thoughtful about how we go through our decision-making processes.
Originally, we were considering opening a second restaurant, but we love what we've built here so much. And in the time it took to find another space, we realized that we had grown a little bit too big for this one. And the community interest and the support that we've been receiving in this space exceed what we're able to offer.
This might change in the future, but we love running one restaurant! I don't know that running two is what our passion is right now. So, with all the love we have for HAGS and the community we've built around it, we want to reinvest in it. And it felt like good timing for us. We've been in this space for almost four years. We signed the lease at least five years ago. It feels like a good, logical time to grow.
Camille Lindsley: I think it's always easier — and this is the first restaurant that we've owned and operated — to start small and grow as you're capable.
What attracted you to this particular location on the Bowery? What did you see in it?
Justice: We looked at a lot of spaces. When we found this space, it was the peak of the pandemic in 2021, and we looked at so many spaces because so many were vacant. I think that really informed what we look for in a commercial space, and we wanted to take a lot of time to see a lot of spaces when making this next decision.
We also knew we did not want to do another gut renovation like we did here. We were very excited to open our first restaurant, and we were caught up in this idea of creating something from scratch that was identifiable and uniquely ours. We wanted something with really good bones, something we could apply our vision to without having to pull a million permits with the City and do so much construction. We wanted to move into a place that felt ready to receive our concept and put our vision on it.
So, the new space is in really great shape. The folks who had it before us took good care of it. It looks nice.
Lindsley: I think that we've taken a lot of time the last few years because there is the practical reality that the real estate market post-pandemic has really changed. It's much more competitive, and it's a lot harder to find a second-generation restaurant space with the seat capacity we were looking for that's still relatively close to where we currently are.
The East Village has been incredibly good to us, and being L-train-adjacent or easy to get to and from Brooklyn is really important for many of our diners — and for many of our staff as well. Being in a larger space makes sense given the existing conditions. We are not eager, as Telly was saying, to do a ton of construction work on a space because it takes so much time.
Justice: It is a ton of work to open a space, but it'll be intentional design work. We want it to feel like what we've built here. We want to show the community that what we grow into is equally intentional.
Will it look the same? Will the menu be the same? What will be new and what will be different?
Lindsley: There will definitely be some aesthetic similarities, but we're looking to evolve that as well. There are more things that you can do with a bigger space. And there are fun quirks of what already exists there that we want to play up. And there are some important HAGS-specific color palettes and visuals we want to implement. It will be exciting to see how we Hagsify the dining room there. We are planning to open up the kitchen in that space because it is currently closed. Here, we have an open kitchen, and we'd like to keep that as part of the concept.
Justice: Yeah, and additionally, one of the big driving desires to go to a larger space is that here, the business model — due to the size and the space — it's very restricted to doing tasting menu service. That's been essential for us to maintain the sustainability of the business. We don't necessarily feel like that's the most essential part of what HAGS is at its DNA level.
So we're really excited to expand into à la carte and more casual entry points to the menu, where people can come for some light bites, maybe a drink at the bar, or have a more upscale, experiential dinner if they like. Being able to feed more people across different dining levels will be a big part of what we do.
Will this space close before the next one opens? Will there be an overlap?
Lindsley: We're not sure.
Justice: Hard to say at this point. Ideally, the fantasy is that we can lock this door and then unlock that one, but I know with the City, sometimes it's hard for the perfect way to be the way it happens. But we're gonna try.
Lindsley: Life never really ever goes exactly as planned.
What will the new space allow that you cannot do now?
Lindsley: Definitely more flexibility in terms of options for dining, having more ways in which you can enjoy the space as a diner, and having the option for à la carte. Additionally, we're hoping for a full liquor license. So that is an exciting, hopeful development as well.
Justice: I think that we've hopefully been good neighbors here, and the community can vouch for the positive impact that we have on our block and in the East Village.
Did you ever imagine the restaurant would grow to this point when you first opened?
Lindsley: No way!
Justice: No.
I think, speaking for myself, we started this concept expecting that it would fail. We thought that maybe we had a good year or two in us. We thought it was a crazy idea from the beginning. We knew there was a lot of trust built into the model, and that people would come and support the things we thought were special, interesting, and cool about the project. We knew that was a big ask of people, of the neighborhood, of the community, but we were really, really surprised, and I'm still surprised and so humbled by how supportive people are of what we do.
It's such a privilege to get to grow. It's a dream.
