261: Stiletto Puncture Test
Jessica Gidari's career started in interior design before widening into branding and eventually hospitality. She made stops at Rockwell Group and LDV Hospitality before landing at Union Square Hospitality Group, where she led the consulting division and developed concepts for clients like JPMorgan. She is founder of Porcelain Collective, an agency that handles everything from menu writing to branding to full concept development for restaurants. Susan and Jessica talk about hotel dining, high heels, and hatch chilies.
What You'll Learn
- How a Phoenix restaurant opening turned an interior designer into a hospitality lifer
- Why bouncing between Rockwell Group, LDV Hospitality, and Union Square Hospitality Group added up to one throughline instead of three separate careers
- What pushed Jessica to trade a stable job for the risk of starting her own agency
- How Jessica balances rigid process with gut instinct when building a new concept
- What trick Jessica uses to keep clients' personal taste out of a design that has to perform
- What most hoteliers overlook when their vision meets their actual budget and floor plan
- Why so many hotel investors assume a restaurant will fill itself once the doors open
- What changes when you're designing a menu for travelers instead of diners
- The one question Jessica says every hotelier should ask before touching their restaurant concept
- What cuisine Jessica is still waiting for someone to nail outside its home turf
Key takeaway:
The best hotel restaurants succeed by dropping the hotel-restaurant label altogether, standing on their own as distinct brands built with real structure and genuine hospitality.
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