Andrew Carmellini, Luke Ostrom and Josh Pickard Run NoHo’s 23 Venues
Observer ·
NoHo Hospitality’s 23-venue portfolio grew again in 2026. Its co-founders discuss Detroit, the Public Theater and the deal behind Locanda Verde.
Andrew Carmellini, Luke Ostrom and Josh Pickard run NoHo Hospitality, a 23-venue group across New York and Detroit that the partners say serves roughly 35,000 covers a week. In Detroit, where NoHo operates four venues at the Shinola Hotel, Ostrom and Pickard opened Saksey’s, a cocktail lounge, with Dan Gilbert’s family last November. In September, the three partners teamed with Authentic Hospitality on Ray’s Detroit, the two groups’ first collaboration, and opened The Astor and a second Bar Torino inside The Public Theater in New York.
The line at Lafayette’s bakery can run half an hour, and its Suprême—a circular, cream-filled croissant introduced in April 2022—has been copied by bakeries from Singapore to London. Carmellini once found one on vacation in Costa Rica sold as a “Lafayette donut.” Mario Carbone , Rich Torrisi and David Chang worked under Carmellini at Café Boulud before building Major Food Group and Momofuku.
Carmellini, Ostrom and Pickard are 2026 Observer Nightlife & Dining Power List honorees. They spoke with Observer about the restaurant they nearly walked away from during the financial crisis and what Detroit demands that New York doesn’t.
The Public relationship goes back to 1998, when Pickard helped launch Joe’s Pub . What changes when you’re feeding an audience at the Public Theater?
Andrew Carmellini, Luke Ostrom and Josh Pickard: With The Astor and Bar Torino, we’ve been able to build on that relationship and create more opportunities for people to gather before or after a show.
What’s interesting about hospitality in a theater is that you’re often part of a much bigger experience. Many are coming to see a performance, celebrate an occasion or spend an evening out, and our role is to make the food and hospitality feel like a natural extension of that.
What does running restaurants in Detroit demand that New York doesn’t?
Carmellini: Detroit actually came about through my partner Josh Pickard, who’s from the city. When we first visited, I was really impressed by the local culinary community and the talented chefs already doing interesting things there.
Pickard: Detroit teaches you the importance of community and relationships in a way that New York doesn’t always. In New York, you have incredible density, constant foot traffic and an endless stream of new customers. In Detroit, you have to work harder to earn people’s loyalty, and that loyalty is everything.
Detroit also teaches you to be more resourceful, patient and thoughtful about what you’re creating.
The Suprême was being copied within weeks and eventually turned up around the world. How did you react?
Carmellini and Ostrom: At first, we were upset about it. We had created something unique in its presentation, and within about 30 days, we started seeing other bakeries making their own versions. First California, then Japan and Korea, and within a year they were everywhere. We were seeing some of the most respected pastry chefs in France making them and calling them “New York rolls.”
But eventually we had to laugh about it. At the end of the day, someone came up with every dish that’s now a staple on restaurant menus. Someone else invented the muffin, right? That’s how food evolves—chefs take inspiration from one another and put their own spin on things. What’s strange now is just how quickly an idea can travel around the world with social media.
Whipped ricotta has traveled, too. Where did the Locanda Verde version come from?
Carmellini: Well, we didn’t invent it, but it wasn’t a thing that was around 25 years ago. It actually evolved from a picnic we made ourselves in Abruzzo in the ’90s. We imported the ricotta from Sardinia. A special moment in time, so to speak.
Mario Carbone, Rich Torrisi and David Chang all came through your kitchens. Did you know what you had?
Carmellini: I’ve been fortunate to work with some incredibly talented people throughout my career, and it’s always rewarding to see people you’ve worked alongside go on to build something of their own.
It also shows how competitive the business is, as those are only three names out of 10,000 that have passed through the ranks. There’s no recipe for success, and it’s not for the weak at heart. Some element of luck helps, along with talent.
You waited more than 30 years to put your name on a restaurant. Why Café Carmellini?
Carmellini: For much of my career, I’ve focused on creating more casual, approachable restaurants, from Locanda Verde and The Dutch to Bar Primi. I loved building those restaurants, but after spending the early part of my career in fine dining, working in some of the world’s great kitchens, I realized how much I missed that style of cooking and hospitality.
Café Carmellini was an opportunity to return to those roots and bring together everything I’ve learned over the past 30-plus years. It’s really the culmination of my career, drawing on my classical French training, Italian heritage and the different cuisines and experiences that have influenced me along the way.
Putting my name on the restaurant was also deeply personal. The Carmellini name is a tribute to my family’s coffee-importing business, which operated in Tuscany for 120 years. Opening night, like all of our opening nights, was chaos, fun and utterly terrifying.
You three have been partners for 17 years. How did the division of labor evolve as the company grew?
Ostrom: AC and I had worked together for years before we started the company, and Josh came into the picture when we were putting together Locanda Verde in 2009. We didn’t necessarily set out to build a restaurant group. We were just trying to open a restaurant together, and things grew from there. We’ve always brought different strengths to the business.
Carmellini: I’m still the guy who wants to be in the restaurants. For a long time, I didn’t even think we needed a corporate office. I thought we could just have meetings in the private dining rooms.
Luke and Josh recognized that, as we grew, we needed a more formal structure.
What’s the deal, lease or opening you almost walked away from?
Ostrom: It was the end of 2008. The market crashed, and nobody knew what was coming for the city or for restaurants. I remember the night AC and I scoped out the former Ago space at The Greenwich Hotel. I think I literally saw a tumbleweed blow across North Moore.
We knew that opening there meant ripping off the white tablecloths and leaning into something approachable, which felt like a massive leap of faith at that time. We had tons of uncertainty in those earlier days, which made it a tough call, and we came pretty close to walking away.
But we did it: Locanda Verde.
Whose restaurant would you take your toughest critic to, other than your own?
Carmellini: I’d take him to Tétou, which closed in Golfe-Juan but reopened in Cannes, France, so he could understand what a real bouillabaisse actually is.
I often find critics don’t understand the actual thing because they haven’t traveled there to experience it, to understand its context in the place, its history, its flavor, its meaning. That goes for bouillabaisse, phở Nam or a Salzburger Nockerl.