Gregory Gourdet brings global French flavors to Printemps New York flagship

Gregory Gourdet helped make Printemps New York look less like a department store than a place to spend an evening. The three-time James Beard Award winner was named culinary director on July 26, 2024, and when the French luxury house opened its first U.S. location at One Wall Street on March 21, 2025, food sat at the center of the strategy.

Printemps built the Financial District flagship around five dining concepts: Maison Passerelle, Café Jalu, Salon Vert, the Red Room Bar and a Champagne bar. The company said the menus and stories across the spaces reflected Gourdet’s lifetime of cooking and experiences, a move that shows how luxury retail is using restaurants to pull people back into physical stores in an era shaped by online competition and weaker foot traffic. Public reporting described the store as about 55,000 square feet across two floors designed by French architect Laura Gonzalez.

Maison Passerelle became the flagship fine-dining draw. The 85-seat restaurant has its own entrance on Wall Street, giving it the feel of a standalone destination rather than an amenity tucked inside a retail floor. Printemps said the menu reinterpreted classic French dishes through the lens of the French diaspora, linking New York and France through flavors from the French Caribbean, French Africa and French Asia. Resy noted that Maison Passerelle means bridge in French, a fitting name for a restaurant meant to connect two cities and multiple culinary traditions.

Gourdet’s own path helped shape that concept. Before returning to New York, he built his reputation in Portland, Oregon, and in interviews he said he researched dining in France before launch, visiting older restaurants, cafés, Michelin-starred tasting menus and farm dining rooms to capture a sense of Paris while bringing something new to New York.

The result is a retail flagship built around occasions as much as shopping. Menu and event pages have shown recurring programming, including Mother’s Day prix fixe offerings at Maison Passerelle and Salon Vert, underscoring Printemps’ bet that food, design and hospitality can turn a store into a reason to cross town. In lower Manhattan, that means the competition is no longer just other retailers. It is the city itself, and Printemps is trying to win by making dinner the entry point.