Restaurant Matchbooks Are Cool Once more in D.C.

For those who went to a stylish restaurant and didn’t carry residence a cute matchbook memento, did you actually go there?

Restaurant and bar matchbox units are the recent new collectibles du jour — simply ask Angie, a 20-something D.C.-based influencer recognized on-line as @phoebeindc. She’s constructed a base of tens of hundreds of social media followers by sharing her vintage-y residence decor, together with a rising assortment of matchbooks. (She even has one together with her namesake, due to the brand new West Finish bistro Bar Angie.)

“Accumulating matchbooks is an element of a bigger pattern that’s actively rejecting the lifeless, minimal decor that has been in fashion for the final decade and a half,” Angie tells Eater. “I feel individuals really need their properties to have private touches and heat, and matchbooks are one small technique to obtain that.”

The observe of eating places utilizing matchbooks to advertise their manufacturers dates again to the early 1900s — a time when the necessity for a mechanism to gentle a cigarette was much more frequent than it’s now. They largely fell out of favor when smoking did, however have made a resurgence prior to now few years as a stylish collectible to select up from the host stand after a meal.

Although matchbooks have turn into a nostalgic relic of eating places previous, it isn’t primarily the older restaurant patrons who’re keen to select one up on their method out the door — it’s the 20- and 30-something crowds, Farid Azouri, co-founder of DC’s Residents Cafe and Bar and River Membership, tells Eater DC. Name it an extension of the throwback traits that additionally made vinyl information, early 2000s digital cameras, and even deviled eggs cool once more.

“Most individuals my age that I do know are actively making an attempt to cut back our display screen time as a result of we acknowledge how addictive our telephones are,” Angie says. “After I see a matchbook in my residence, I can relive that reminiscence of an evening once I went out with my buddies or my husband and had a tremendous meal and laughed across the desk for hours, no display screen time required.”

And when a restaurant closes, it turns into all of the extra particular to have a limited-edition memento. Angie ceaselessly makes use of the matches she collects at Barcelona Wine Bar, however the brilliant pink matchbox from Bar Spero, downtown’s upscale Basque restaurant that shut down final 12 months, is a relic that may stay untouched.

“It’s like an artwork piece,” says Victoria Simmerling, vp of improvement at Scale Hospitality, which owns Reynold’s, a brand new bar in Dupont Circle, together with resort Sixty DC’s anchor restaurant Casamara. “It’s an amazing dialog starter. It makes you keep in mind the place after.”

Matchbooks aren’t only a cute element added on the final minute. Newer spots at the moment are fascinated about using matchbooks as an extension of their advertising.

The artwork of a restaurant matchbook is discovering methods to make the tiny little fire-starters match (no pun meant) the model’s vibe, be it via distinctive shapes, sizes, colours and different inventive design selections. Capitol Hill’s award-winning Mexican spot Pascual presents a matchbook with an inscription inside quoting an excerpt from the poem “Piedra Photo voltaic” by Nobel Prize-winning Mexican poet Octavio Paz. Le Diplomate’s matchboxes have an eye catching yellow and purple cowl that includes the brasserie’s emblem and matching red-tipped matches inside. River Membership even has some large, smartphone-sized containers that they handed out at their opening and to some choose VIP visitors.

And whereas high quality of the particular matches isn’t unimportant, a number of homeowners have expressed the significance of aesthetics over all the things else.

”We didn’t lower any corners [in developing River Club], particularly by way of the design, elements we use, even the sound system,” says Azouri. “We determined after we’re going to supply one thing, we’re not going to go for a budget possibility.”

Twenty-five cents per matchbox may not sound lots, however while you order 50,000 of them, as River Membership did, out of the blue you’re taking a look at a $12,500 price ticket — and that’s not together with the price of outsourcing the design. River Membership employed Lillian Ling, the inventive director and founding father of branding studio Stray Rabbit, who’s additionally labored with The Dabney, All Goal, Fortunate Hazard, Any Day Now, Pineapple & Pearls, and Grazie Nonna.

However within the grand scheme of issues, that’s a small worth to pay contemplating their attain.

“Fifty thousand individuals ultimately may have a little bit branded merchandise of their residence. It’s a nice marking software,” Azouri says.

Reynold’s introduced on Toronto-based branding company One Technique, which designed all the things from the emblem on the matchbook cowl to the distinctive form of the matches and the intelligent inscriptions on every match.

“We match the matchbox to the vibe of the place,” Simmerling says. Reynold’s is known as after Maria Reynolds, who Hamilton followers might acknowledge as the lady who had an affair with Alexander Hamilton. Salacious inscriptions on every match fluctuate from, “To like is to burn, to be on hearth” to “I want my martini filthy.”

“With each strike, there’s a brand new, enjoyable factor to learn,” Simmerling says. “Our tagline is ‘A legacy of infamous rendezvous,’ so we’re having a little bit of enjoyable with that.”

The free branding advantages transcend the potential for noticing a cool matchbook on a buddy’s espresso desk. Influencers make viral movies sharing the place locals — and people visiting — can increase their very own collections.

“Individuals are really going out of their technique to eat and drink at locations the place they know they’ll get a matchbook,” says Angie.

Prepared to begin (or proceed to construct) your personal native matchbook stash? The next 38 D.C. spots are nice locations to begin. However take into account, some locations don’t instantly restock after working out. We suggest calling forward to examine on availability.