A wine-driven, members-only club is currently under construction next to Upper Kirby’s Levy Park. Called 55 Seventy, the game-changing facility is on track to open at the end of November.
Prior to opening 55 Seventy’s original Dallas location in 2022, founder Tommy Shuey worked in finance. During the Covid-19 pandemic, he started looking around for new business ventures and quickly discovered that Dallas’ private wine storage facilities were completely sold out, despite, in his assessment, being relatively out of the way compared to where its clients live and not very nice inside.
“The thought was, why don't I just make this nicer and charge more and put it in their backyard and really offer that quality and convenience that I feel like a wine collector would appreciate on storing wine,” Shuey tells CultureMap.
He also envisioned a club component that would offer more than just a place for collectors to drink. It would provide a full service restaurant that serves breakfast, lunch, and dinner daily, along with the ability to host private events with custom menus. Dallasite embraced the concept, selling out memberships and prompting Shuey and his partner, sommelier Jeff Gregory, to search for a second location. They quickly identified Houston as the right place to expand.
Bigger and better
“Our winery partners, when they come for a tasting, they always go to Houston first or second,” Shuey says. Later, he adds, “The more I started digging into this Houston market, the more this is not going to be news to you, but you start unraveling this underbelly of wine in Houston. I'm convinced that Houston is the largest wine city in the country. It is unbelievable.”
With lessons learned from the Dallas location, Houston’s 55 Seventy will be even more grand — a 30,000-square-foot, newly constructed building that will be able to hold as many as 150,000 bottles of wine while offering its members two restaurants, a demonstration kitchen, lounge areas, private dining and meeting spaces, and an art gallery. Houston's Gin Design Group is handling the interiors; as illustrated above, the club will have an Art Deco-inspired design.
“We've learned so much. A lot of it is learning, hey, we have to do this differently or we want to do it this way,” Shuey says. “And some of it's a guess. I think people are going to use the club differently from Dallas. I think Houston is a later city, and I think that they come in bigger groups more frequently than Dallas.
“The one thing we know for sure is that Houston is a more adventurous food city. And it's a higher bar than Dallas. And so we hired two chefs, both of Michelin experience, to elevate the program.”
While the food program will follow the template created in Dallas by executive chef and partner Josh Sutcliff, a veteran of Dallas’ acclaimed FT33 who’s committed to local sourcing and scratch cooking, day-to-day operations will be overseen by executive chef Diego Fernandez, who brings experience from Michelin-starred restaurants Alinea (Chicago), Quince (San Francisco), and time with research and development team at Pappas Restaurants. Executive banquet chef Jacob Solomon brings experience from the Michael Mina group to all of 55 Seventy’s private dining and events.
55 Seventy’s main restaurant is located on its first floor. It will feature a wide-ranging menu centered around steak and seafood, along with sushi and vegetarian items. Shuey notes that many items will be able to be modified to accommodate gluten-free and other food allergies. Whereas the Dallas location opened with a 220-square-foot kitchen, later expanded to 660, the Houston club will have almost 2,000 square feet of kitchen space, giving both chefs plenty of room to cook.
The second restaurant is called Canopy Bar. Located on the roof, it will serve pizzas and other Mediterranean-style fare. A nano wall will protect diners from the elements.
“The goal is to have something a little more casual and approachable,” Shuey says. “I think what we're most excited about is to have those two very different restaurant options for our members versus in Dallas.”
Shuey has made a similar commitment to the wine side of 55 Seventy by recruiting master sommelier Justin Moore to serve as executive director of wine. Most recently with Washington, D.C.’s Rose’s Restaurant Group that operates three, one-star Michelin restaurants — Pineapple and Pearls, Rose’s Luxury, and Little Pearl — Moore will oversee the club’s wine list as well as a wine brokerage service that will help members grow their collections.
“I have deep respect for the classic benchmark producers, and I love finding the bottle nobody has heard of yet,” Moore said in a statement. “Houston appreciates both, and our list will reflect that.”
Who the members are
Two months before opening, 55 Seventy has already sold about 1,000 memberships. Ultimately, the club could offer as many as 3,000, but Shuey wants to build that slow. For now, the aim is to have enough people that both restaurants feel lively and that members are able to make connections with each other over great bottles.
Beyond being able to pay the various fees — an initial payment of $6,000 for an individual, $7,500 for a couple, or $20,000 for a company, plus about $500 per month — Shuey says members typical have a certain perspective in common.
“It's somebody who is at the stage of their life where they appreciate the finer things, food, wine, cocktails, and hospitality. If they're willing to appreciate the fact that we are sourcing our beef from a local producer, and they'll pay a little bit more for that because it's quality. It's somebody who wants their wine made by hand by a winemaker who's reputable and not by a machine and a factory somewhere. It's really somebody that wants our staff to know their name when they walk in and feel appreciated.
“You're talking about partners at law firms, business owners, wealth management, firm partners, you're talking about people that live in the area and just love food and wine. People that work in the industry that have that like real appreciation for what we're building. And we don't want it to be stuffy. We want it to be approachable.”
As he notes, service is a big part of 55 Seventy’s appeal. Since it isn’t operating with the same financial considerations as a stand-alone restaurant, the club doesn’t need to turn tables. A member can claim a spot all night, drink a bottle from their cellar, and eat as much or as little as they want to.
55 Seventy is expected to open on Friday, November 27. It will be located at 3015 Richmond Ave. Membership inquiries may be directed to membership.houston@55seventy.com.
The Swift BLDG is expected to open next fall.Courtesy of Radom Capital
