This Art Collector Is Building One Of The Most Interesting Restaurant Groups

Spicy Hospitality Group has already exceeded expectations since its debut a year ago.

World Red Eye

Andre Sakhai is not a chef. He has never worked a line and never staged a dish in a Michelin-starred kitchen. What he has done is travel extensively, eat very well and collect art seriously. During that time, he spent years building relationships with chefs and concepts he believed had a place in the United States but hadn’t yet found a way to get there. In 2024, he decided to create these spaces himself. The result is Spicy Hospitality Group, a Miami-based hospitality company that, for something barely a year old, has already exceeded expectations.

The portfolio spans YASU Omakase, an eight-seat counter helmed by Chefs Yasu Tanaka and Raymond Li; KARYU, a kaiseki experience built around one of the most specific wagyu programs in the country; The Joyce, a 45-seat American dining room anchored by a burger that took three years to develop; and Le Specialita, a 100-seat Italian concept. The thread connecting all of the concepts traces directly back to how Sakhai thinks about art.

“Art teaches you how to see,” says Andre Sakhai, founder of Spicy Hospitality Group, in an interview. “It teaches you restraint, composition and how different elements sit together in a space. I approach restaurants the same way. It is not just about the food, it is about how everything interacts. A great restaurant should feel collected, not assembled.”

This premise is why Spicy Hospitality Group’s portfolio feels coherent despite spanning formats that have very little in common on the surface. Most hospitality groups grow by repeating what works. Sakhai’s approach is closer to curation, where each addition has to earn its place against a consistent standard. “Each concept comes together differently,” he says, “but the standards around detail, design and execution stay consistent. When you have a clear sense of what you’re building, and the right partners and opportunities align, it becomes easier to recognize what fits and move on it naturally.”

The filter is always the same. “If a concept or chef has proven itself at a high level and has a clear identity, that’s usually where the conversation starts,” he says. “From there, it’s about whether it can translate without losing what made it work in the first place. A lot of that instinct comes from how I like to eat, where I spend time when I travel and the kinds of formats I naturally gravitate toward. There’s usually a common thread around precision, restraint and a strong point of view. It has to stand on its own, and it has to align with the standard we’re trying to maintain across the portfolio.”

YASU and KARYU are both intimate, controlled formats where exclusivity is structural rather than manufactured. “An eight-seat counter or a ten-seat kaiseki experience is meant to be intimate, controlled, and highly specific,” Sakhai says. “Trying to scale that would dilute the experience. The visibility comes from consistency. When something is executed at that level, it creates its own demand.” The broader portfolio, spanning from eight seats to a hundred, allows the group to operate at very different scales while still bringing the same underlying sensibility to each one. “Not everything needs to be that small, but bringing elements of that approach into a larger format is something we think about a lot,” he says.

Sourcing follows the same level of specificity. At YASU, a significant portion of the seafood comes directly from Toyosu Market in Tokyo, alongside carefully selected local products. “That balance keeps the menu grounded in Japanese tradition while still reflecting its environment,” Sakhai says. At KARYU, the wagyu program is built around Tajimaguro beef from Ueda Chikusan in Hyogo Prefecture, a family-run ranch with a tightly controlled breeding program. KARYU is the only restaurant in the U.S. sourcing from that producer. “That level of precision defines the concept,” he says. “Across the portfolio, decisions are made with that same level of intent, based on what each dish requires and the standard it needs to meet.”

Each concept also evolves differently. At YASU, the menu is always moving, driven by seasonality and wherever Chefs Yasu and Raymond are in their thinking at any given moment. KARYU is the opposite, focusing on structure and staying true to what has already been refined in Japan. The Joyce is more fluid.

Dishes come on and off as off-menu specials quietly become staples through guest response. The Joyce Burger, after three years of development, has become one of the most recognized dishes across the entire portfolio. “The approach is to allow signatures to reveal themselves over time,” Sakhai says, “while continuing to refine and evolve within the framework of each concept.” Even the wine program at The Joyce follows a similar logic, “built around great producers, but structured in a way that encourages people to engage with it, not just treat it as something reserved for special occasions.”

The Joyce is also where everything started. “It was my first restaurant, built with Chef James Taylor, and it gave me a real understanding of what it takes to operate at a high level, what works, what doesn’t and how much detail actually matters,” says Sakhai. From there, it became less about opening more restaurants and more about acting on years of accumulated exposure.

“I had spent years traveling, eating and building relationships with chefs and concepts that I felt had a place in the U.S., but needed the right structure to translate properly,” he says. “Right now, there’s a window where a lot of that talent is open to expanding, but they’re selective about how and where it happens. If you can provide the right environment and the right level of support, it creates an opportunity to build something that feels considered and long-term.”

In April, the group brought Chef Motokichi Yukimura of Kichi Kichi in Kyoto to the U.S. for his first multi-city tour, introducing his signature omurice with a Land Bar Artisan collaboration ahead of its New York debut later this year. It reflects where Sakhai sees the group going, aiming to build long-term relationships with globally recognized talent rather than chasing one-off guest appearances. Coming up are Land Bar Artisan, Pizza Studio Temaki with Chef Tsubasa Tamaki and Tanaka New York with Chef Nikuya Tanaka.

“Growth will come as a result of staying disciplined,” Sakhai says. “If we stay disciplined in how we approach each project and where we choose to expand, it naturally builds into something more meaningful over time.” For a group that has been operating for just over a year, it already feels like something more meaningful.