ASPEN ART MUSEUM
SUMMER 2024 EDITION
17
Food
the world-class programming and architecture. It deserves to have some- thing great upstairs that also serves the community. LL I was just there and saw the John Chamberlain show, which was really remarkable. PIE You’re both known for running very successful companies on your own, so I’m curious about the collaborative process between the two of you. LL Larry and I have known each other for a long time. MML Hospitality was born in 2021, when I joined with Larry and Tom [Moorman], who had already been working together since 2009. And now we all work on restau- rants and hotels together. Also, before that, Larry and I had started Lambert McGuire Design, because we are both heavily involved in the creation of our brands and places, and so we wanted an in-house team. PIE Since both of you are so closely identied with Austin and West Texas, I’m curious about how you approach projects elsewhere. Larry, you touched on the menu and working with seasonal ingredients, but is there any shift in philosophy or change in your approach when you’re working somewhere like Aspen? LM We haven’t spread all over the place. We stayed in Austin for a long time before we started growing outside of it, so when we go somewhere, we really have to enjoy spending time there. When we started coming to Aspen for Clark’s, we rented a house and started skiing; now Tom and I both have second family homes here. We often come to Aspen together and also separately. Liz now comes up and skis. Aspen has always been a great t for us and we’ve really gotten to love it—the outdoors, the people, the art scene. LL It was the home of Hunter S. Thompson and Thomas W. Benton—it has a long history as a rowdy, non- conformist place. PIE I know you have other projects here. Can you talk about what’s in the works for you? LM We bought the Aspen Chalet about four years ago. LL We’ve been working on it for a couple of years, so we’re excited to see it kick o. I think we both love hotels and restaurants that change neighbor- hoods, become an anchor. PIE One of the themes I see in your work is restoring the hotel and the restaurant into more of a community space. LL We like places that feel alive, and maybe the only way for them to really feel alive is to infuse them with community and reasons for people to go and gather there. We like places where you can bring your whole family and which kids will love, too. LM We don’t love newness, but I think we try to bring something new to our projects. There’s a certain world- class quality that we’re after, from big metropolitan areas, but we usually choose to work in smaller places. LL And the Aspen Art Museum project is very exciting for us. We do a lot of going into older buildings that are not at their best, so it’s really great to go into such a beautiful space.
CAFÉ CULTURE Liz Lambert and Larry McGuire of MML Hospitality are bringing new flavors to the museum’s rooftop with Swedish Hill Aspen
well-known local bakery, open since the 1970s, that we bought ve years ago. We evolved it into more of a grand café, an all-day hangout. In terms of design, we’re denitely not trying to reinvent the wheel with this project, but to do something that accentuates the architecture, celebrates the views and embraces the airiness of the rooftop patio. We want to make the restaurant aordable and accessible to the whole town, and keep it healthy, all without compromising on quality. In the mornings, it’ll be a great place to have good coee and baked goods that we’ll produce at our bakery, Louis Swiss, down in the valley. We also really want to utilize the farmers’ market that
goes all summer, starting in June, which is right in front of the museum. We’re excited to have a seasonal, produce-driven menu, with handmade pastas, salads and sandwiches. We hope to be a great museum café. There are good examples emerging around the country, and we are trying to create something that locals will want to come to on a daily basis. LIZ LAMBERT Who doesn’t love a museum café? PIE I love a museum café—and don’t get me started on the gift shop! But yes, the museum is free, so it’s really accessi- ble, and anybody can come just to have lunch. LM Exactly, the museum’s always free, which is pretty unique, considering
PATRICIA ISABEL ESCÁRCEGA Larry, can you begin by telling me a little bit about how the partnership with the Aspen Art Museum came about? LARRY MCGUIRE We’ve had businesses in Aspen for six or seven years now, including Clark’s Oyster Bar, so we have forged some good relationships here, and through friends and people on the museum’s board, we began conversations about how to revamp the restaurant on the roof. PIE Can you talk about the concept, what the menu will look like and any design features? LM We’re dipping into an existing concept that we have in Austin, called Swedish Hill, which is a really
Illustration Clay Hickson
To learn more about our café, visit: aspenartmu- seum.org/cafe
Liz Lambert and Larry McGuire are partners, with Tom Moorman, at MML Hospitality. They live in Austin.
Patricia Isabel Escárcega is a journalist. She lives in Los Angeles.
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