Behind the Curtain
Issue #1 - February 2026
One year ago, I started ASANO with a simple premise: beautiful restaurants sit empty every morning, and that’s mottainai (wasteful, in Japanese). I wanted to create a win-win solution—restaurants earn effortless revenue, while neighborhoods get great coffee and a new place to build community. It’s a simple concept—but one that gets more complex once you dig a little deeper.
It’s been incredibly rewarding for me, the restaurants, the community, and my small but growing team. In the past year, I’ve learned more about coffee, human nature, running a small business, and myself than I ever anticipated. So in the vein of my stress-reducing mantra, “This is all an experiment”, so begins experiment #572: substack.
With Behind the Curtain, I want to share my founder journey and the ASANO story as we build this brand from the ground up. Each month, I hope to share stories from the Asano world and I hope you will enjoy reading these tidbits, as you are now part of the story too!
So to start, I love a list. Here are seven things I have learned this past year rather quickly or sometimes slowly:
1. Handing Out Free Coffee Is Called “Solicitation”
I’m proud of my guerrilla marketing phase (ongoing). I’ve befriended every doorman on the Upper East Side, local butchers in the West Village, gyms within two blocks, and probably every pastry chef online. Who doesn’t love free coffee? Well, apartment building managers, apparently. Turns out free coffee inside buildings—even with the super’s blessing—is “solicitation.” Who knew apartment buildings have office politics, too?
2. Not All Matcha Is Created Equal (And Stone Mills Are Apparently Near Extinction)
You all cannot get enough of matcha, truly. I’m proud of the matcha we serve from small farms in Shizuoka, but every three months I’m panic-buying thousands of dollars of it. Why? Because stone mills that grind ceremonial-grade matcha are a hot commodity and are few and far between. And tea farms navigating tariffs sometimes have to personally fill out FedEx customs forms, so my matcha has been Lost in Translation, literally.
3. Stop Wearing White Clothes
I will go home dirty every single day. Coffee stains, matcha powder, mysterious syrups. Also, do not wash used coffee bar towels with actual clothes. I make this mistake once…or five times, but who’s counting?
4. Restaurants and Cafes Are Different Beasts
December is the best month for restaurants. For cafes? The entire city decided caffeine was for losers and pivoted to booze. Meanwhile, restaurants were thriving. The seasonality, marketing, and customer expectations are completely different and so, while there are synergies operating within a restaurant, I’ve learned to take a different perspective when making decisions for ASANO.
5. The Beautiful Symbiosis I Never Predicted
At Sandro’s, we clean the espresso machines religiously, so their evening espresso martinis taste better. We created a loyalty card promotion where customers exchange a completed ASANO loyalty card for an espresso martini at dinner and Sandro Jr has his team hand out free coffee cards to his evening guests, cross-pollinating our audiences. And I love seeing both our teams fist-bumping in the back.
At The Noortwyck, my baristas make coffee for the restaurant team. At 1:30 PM, Chef Andy gets our last cup of drip before his busy prep begins. And The Noortwyck team kindly sets aside family meal for my baristas every day so they can eat between espresso shots. These small kindnesses create retention on both sides. Talk about employee benefits.
6. Culture Isn’t Built on “Something”—It’s Built on “Someone”
I love telling people about ASANO’s mission to help restaurants thrive. But it’s not the mission statement that keeps a team together—I have learned it has to be me. Show up every day the way I want my culture described. I have to be honest about the brutal barista turnover (it’s the industry). Pretty soon, I will hire people who reflect those values, and customers will notice, too. For me, that means building a team that’s warm, meticulous, and genuinely excited about making someone’s morning better.
7. And Lastly, My Top Tip for Anyone:
When entering any restaurant kitchen where you know no one, just call everyone “chef”... It goes a long way.
THIS MONTH AT ASANO
NEW ON OUR MENU: Winter
Orange Olive Oil Muffin - One of our baker’s top items. Perfect with a hot latte. The olive oil keeps it impossibly moist and the orange zest keeps you coming back for another bite.
Gingersnap Latte - Available as espresso or matcha. It’s winter in a cup, with that kick of ginger grounded in notes of caramel. Yum!
COMMUNITY SPOTLIGHT: Elizabeth Vogt (artist)
Tell me about yourself? I am the illustrator and graphic designer behind Asano’s visual identity and branding. I work closely with Kate to create the system of visuals that defines the Asano brand, including the signature poppy-orange “noren” curtains that hang in the doorways of the Asano locations (which were sewn by the amazing Annika Amlie and Elly Rodgers). As the brand grows, I get the chance to design new assets, like special pastry paper, imagery for brand collaborations, and merch (coming soon!!).
In addition to my design work in the restaurant/hospitality space, I am pursuing a MFA at the School of Visual Arts here in New York, in their Illustration program. It’s a program that focuses on all aspects and avenues of illustration, including book illustration, editorial, branding, and advertising, as well as fine art techniques. I am lucky to get to flex my creative skills, learn from all the folks around me, and challenge myself to try new things every day, both in school and in work.
What gets you up in the morning? Definitely my pour-over coffee. I'm not too picky about beans and don't even have a scale (gasp), but I'm an early-riser and just love the ritual of making something when it's still dark out. I've also taken up knitting in 2026, so I look forward to sitting on the subway in the morning and making progress on my slightly misshapen scarf.
What’s something about your work that people don’t see but should know? Something that may surprise people about the visual assets we've created for Asano is that many of the most important design touch points were designed by hand. Kate and I had a few adjectives floating around when it came to branding: whimsical, fresh, and warm. The Asano wordmark (the puffy orange type you see everywhere) was something I originally hand-lettered on paper, and then brought into Adobe Illustrator, rather than drawing it digitally from the get-go, which would perhaps be more typical. In the same vein, the line drawing illustrations of the Asano locations are all hand-drawn in pen and ink on paper. There's just something about starting out with physical materials that lends a handmade, imperfect quality to the final assets that I really like, even if they go through digital manipulations later. I don't like things that look too polished.
I think this style also captures the sensibility of Asano quite well. It's a place that's welcoming, cozy, and all about people—from the amazing Asano baristas, to the chefs downstairs prepping for the restaurant's service later that night, to the regular customers who live around the corner and come in every day for their favorite matcha. Asano is a bold, new idea in hospitality, and there's an amazing amount of playfulness and joy in what this brand is doing and how they're partnering with restaurants and engaging communities. It's a tall order to have the visuals reflect all of that—but that's certainly been my goal thus far and continues to be what we strive towards with every new asset we create.
Best meal you’ve had recently? A newer friend of mine has an (amazingly generous) annual tradition of cooking a multi-course meal from scratch to celebrate their birthday, and I got to attend this year—lucky me. They spent all day in the kitchen prepping the most delicious food— menu highlights included: beef bourguignon over celeriac purée, an amazing ratatouille, and a thai iced tea layer cake with vanilla ice cream. No notes!
If you could have coffee with anyone, dead or alive? This is an easy one for me—it would be my dad. He passed away a little over two years ago, and we used to get coffee together whenever I was visiting home. It's one of the many rituals with him that I miss deeply. He had a favorite local coffee shop that we'd go to where he knew all the baristas and would cheerfully greet them when we walked in the door. We'd grab out drinks and sit outside to catch up. He always gave the best advice. These days, I try to take quiet moments for myself on the weekend, and I like to think that I can channel his energy and wisdom as I enjoy a coffee or pastry alone, just like I used to do with him.
What does your craft mean to you in one sentence? If my work sparks delight for someone, tells a compelling story, or helps bring a meaningful idea to life, then I know that I'm on the right path.
Follow Elizabeth and her artwork here!
MY RECS FOR THE MONTH
To read: A great essay to start the new year off…or your February:
To eat: Leftover Christmas panettone (toasted) with thick lashings of butter and salty anchovies…made by our favorite Lizzie from the Oriana team (Noortwyck’s new sister restaurant)…divine!
Send me your suggestions of what you’d want to hear about: what I’m reading, where I’m eating, or maybe my favorite hospitality moments!
Kate
big fan of asano and loved reading this :) going to the UES location is a weekly staple for me. this foray into substack is such a cool idea! would love more about how you developed the recipes for the drinks and food (my staples are always the morning bun and gochujang scone!!)