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Nine months after Russ & Daughters’ latest expansion first caught notice, the venerable New York City appetizing icon has opened its new operation across 4,400 square feet in midtown, according to New York magazine. This new outpost of the more than century-old family business joins three other Russ & Daughters’ aged from 109 years to a few days old.
“We’ve been terrified every time we’ve expanded,” Josh Russ Tupper, great-grandchild of the shop’s founder, Joel Russ, told the magazine’s Grub Street vertical. “It’s four generations looking at us—not only our family, but four generations of customers, too.”
The huge new space at 502 West 34th Street and Tenth Avenue features a big neon sign above the display case, emblazoned with its name in that familiar Houston Street font. It also has plenty of seats across tables and banquettes, hand-sliced smoked fish, a caviar bar, and, of course, Russ & Daughters top-of-the-line bagels and other baked goods.
"It was a fantastic first day," fourth-generation co-owner Niki Russ Federman told Time Out New York through a rep via email. "There were about 20 people outside before we opened."
"The space had a great vibe and mix of people—from those who work in the area, neighborhood residents and familiar Russ & Daughters regulars. One of the customers who came is in his 80s and grew up coming to the Lower East Side shop as a child. His father was a customer of my grandparents and parents. He has lived across the street for over 30 years. It felt like "bashert" to have that generational continuity from day one," Federman said.
In addition to this latest locale, a retail baking facility in the Brooklyn Navy Yard and the little Lower East Side storefront that started it all, Russ & Daughters also has a sit-down cafe on Orchard Street.
The new midtown addition is open daily from 8am to 4pm.
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