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Posted up in an East Austin wine bar to evade the thick early summer heat, I was eyeing the merch on the wall behind the bar before I’d even ordered. More specifically, I was fixated on a navy cap with spidery, cursive orange embroidery spelling out ‘LoLo Wine.’
“Where are you from?” asked the bartender.
“Ireland, via London,” I replied.
“Oh, London! I was so sorry to hear about P. Franco—it sucks losing that.”
Thousands of miles from home, here I was commiserating over the sudden recent closure of a cult east London artisanal wine bar, compelled—quite happily—into playing up a national cliché for some camaraderie in a new city. By the time the crunchy white wine and sesame-studded pretzel had hit the counter, the cap was in my bag. Support small businesses!
Over the past few years, dining out has evolved into just one more way to articulate our identities to others. Outside of the Instagram carousels of pretty plates and dinner party tables ruffled and red wine-ringed, restaurant merchandise has become just another extension of expressing your taste.
Go on any modern restaurant’s website and you’ll likely find ‘shop’ on their dropdown menu, with a selection of apparel, homeware, wall art, and accessories. This year in particular has felt rife with collaborations, from arbiters of taste both sartorial and sensory. Maybe you’ll be browsing a streetwear e-tailer like END and cop London Turkish restaurant Mangal 2’s collaboration trainer with Puma, or adding to cart the tinned-fish-made-chic Fishwife x Lisa Says Gah! silver fish charm necklace. You can pick up a Dodgers-style t-shirt with your #19 hot pastrami sandwich at LA’s Langer’s deli (established 1947—the shirt is a more recent thing), or bag up your bagels in a now well-worn Baggu x Russ & Daughters tote. Alison Roman even sells merch for fictional spots: a Spudbud Farms burlap tote, or a Roman’s Restaurant crewneck with the tagline: “It’s nothing fancy!”
Merch is an ever-expanding category. My partner picked up plates from Ida, a London neighborhood Italian, for our anniversary, as it was the location of our second date (this was an off-menu special request, but their merch is abundant). La Colombe in Cape Town sells covetable crockery and cutlery designed by local artisans—including a ceramic beehive, a tribute to the region’s honey. It’s the same one that dine-in guests are presented during their tasting menu, opened up to present their mango, pineapple, and coconut petit fours. In 2024, it seems we’ve officially transcended the tote bag.
We’re a nostalgia-driven culture, after all, and caps, tees, or a branded wine bottle opener are easy shorthands for identity. “Where you dine has become a statement, it’s social currency—nab the restaurant merch, or did you even go? It has become a way to identify your crowd, signify your aesthetics, and shamelessly show how well-traveled you are,” says Sofie Thompson, a London-based restaurant PR and marketer and co-founder of culinary events business Hands. Thompson has two items of restaurant merch that she considers “everyday essentials”: the St. John’s ‘Sniffing’ Tote “which is the perfect size bag for running around the city—plus it has a built-in wine compartment which I make use of often,” she adds. “The other is a Four Horseman cap from the Brooklyn restaurant. It’s chocolate brown, super chic, and I pack it wherever I go.”
St. John is a frequent reference in the merch game. The London institution—which recently turned 30, and is located in a much-Instagrammed spartan Smithfield Market dining room—pioneered the nose-to-tail movement, has a pudding list as long as your forearm, and counts fans ranging from the late Anthony Bourdain to the Young British Artists. Their pig-emblazoned totes are as ubiquitous across East London Sunday market crawls as they are on the New York subway. This year, the restaurant partnered with the elegant London menswear brand Drake’s for the second time on a limited edition collection. It features cotton moleskin chore jackets, inspired by St. John co-founder Fergus Henderson’s uniform of classic French work jackets, and a gilet in the vein of fellow co-founder and wine expert Trevor Gulliver’s wardrobe.
“It’s a bit of a cliché but I own—and often wear—a St. John t-shirt,” says Jack Stanley, a writer, editorial consultant, and co-founder of Slop magazine, a publication about produce. “It’s probably the restaurant I’ve been to the most, so it feels right to have something from there. It was a gift from a friend so it means a lot to me.” He also owns a cap from smoked fish and grocery institution Zabar’s in New York and a t-shirt from Paris’ neighborhood bistrot Cafe du Coin. Right now, he’s eyeing t-shirts from Wine is Fine in Athens and a gilda-studded t-shirt from Rita’s in Soho, London.
Slop caps also pop up on the heads of young Londoners and further afield. “When we first released the caps they were mostly bought by our friends and family, so it’s been surreal to see that spread and other people start buying them,” Stanley says. “I still get texts from some people whenever they see one in the wild, and I’ve stopped being able to track down the wearers. It’s amazing to make something, put it out into the world, and see people enjoy it.”
Independent food media is rich and vibrant, from Slop’s celebration of sacred food practices and traditions, to Cake Zine’s bold and full-bodied deep dives into candy, cookies, and pies. Tanya Bush, Cake Zine’s co-founder, as well as a Brooklyn-based writer and pastry chef at Egg, has a staunch, thoughtful allegiance to food merch. “As a small business owner, I’m all too aware of the importance of merch on increasingly narrow margins. It’s an easy way for me to support businesses I care about.” Bush often wears Superiority Burger’s Vegan Night t-shirt and a Mold Magazine bag, “which is perfect for schlepping ingredients to the restaurant and, unlike most totes, miraculously has pockets.”
“I read and admire Mold and eat at Superiority Burger at least twice a month, so it’s nice to integrate both of them into my everyday life,” she adds.
COVID felt like a particular inflection point for restaurant and food brand merch—with kitchens closed, it was a way to support our much-missed local spots and for businesses to make some revenue. That spirit of support has lingered—but can that spirit keep hospitality afloat with increasingly fewer covers, shorter checks, more caps?
“We have entered a dark world where restaurants count on merch sales to make their year by adding $40 coffee mugs to their Deliveroo page in hopes that some fool will snatch one up alongside their Coke Zero,” says Jason Stewart, a DJ, Substack writer, and one half of the How Long Gone podcast, who often wears a hat from Fish King, a seafood market in L.A.’s Glendale neighborhood he’s been going to for decades. “And a long-sleeved t-shirt from Mario’s Deli—that’s been demoted as gym clothes,” he adds. Jason’s collection is small and predominantly features businesses he patronizes and loves. “One should never wear merch that one doesn’t believe in,” he notes.
As Stewart says, it’s become harder to discern actual taste with a glut of t-shirts and totes. It’s not dissimilar to the cultural neutering music merch has gone through. “People consider merch to be clothes with words on them, instead of a badge of honor they earned, and are telling the world they support the artistic endeavors of someone or something they love,” he says. ”It’s like someone saying, ‘I love music,’ instead of a specific artist. It reminds me of when the Kardashians started wearing obscure Metallica t-shirts, and Metalhead dudes would get angry and demand Kendall name five of their songs. I’m going up to some knob in a River Cafe tote and asking them to name five mains.” If merch should be made with intention, does a screen-printed Fruit of the Loom tee cut it anymore? “It’s painfully plain to see when a piece of merch is disposable, thoughtless, or ill-intended. Death to false merchandise, I say,” Stewart concludes.
Zoe Suen, a London-based writer, editor, and consultant who writes the food and fashion traversing newsletter Floss, loves giving food merch as gifts—friends have received items from St. John and London Japanese udon noodle bar Koya. She owns the ‘vegetable guide’ tea towel from Poons—a Chinese heritage food brand, and now-closed Michelin-starred restaurant turned roving pop-up famed for its wontons—“which I’ve been meaning to iron out and frame in our flat,” she says. Right now, she’s coveting Bao’s gau bao bun-shaped soy wax candles (currently, sold out). “There’s also something to be said about better-known brands in luxury and fashion no longer carrying the same social capital, and food—and restaurants more specifically—taking over that caché since they’ve become more culturally relevant. See, The Bear,” Suen says.
The relationship between food and fashion, whether performative or wholly authentic, continues to evolve. Victoria Beckham recently named a handbag after Michelin-starred celeb favorite Dorian, a rowdy local bistro in Notting Hill. And earlier this year, Chopova Lowena collaborated with British mayo brand Hellmann’s on the Margaret bag, designed specially to carry a jar of the white stuff. (It also comes with a Victorian silver spoon, so you never leave home without a potential snack.)
But in a world where we’re encouraged to constantly telegraph our tastes—gastronomic or otherwise—food merch has found its way to become a fashion statement all of its own. The camera eats first, and your clothes can speak while you have your fill.