When the Moroccan financier Aziz Nahas decided to buy and regenerate a farm outside Marrakesh about two decades ago, he underestimated how much would grow there. Now, the 10-acre plot produces organic vegetables and fruits as well as hosting an artist residency program and a ceramic studio, all under the name Sanctuary Slimane. In 2021, Nahas’s friend the French restaurateur Benjamin Pastor suggested they partner up to start a cafe and farm shop in the busy Marrakesh neighborhood of Gueliz. Last spring, they opened the coffee shop Blue Ribbon, with offerings including fresh salads served with halloumi or beets and almonds and a bánh mí sandwich on fresh sourdough. In the fall, they added a seating area next door and the Slimane Farm Shop, which sells vegetables and products like honey and dried herbs that are grown and produced on the farm. Up next: Farmers, a restaurant headed by Blue Ribbon’s chef and located in the same building. The 46-seat space, lined with colorful Popham tiles, is scheduled to open at the end of February. blueribbonmarrakech.com.
Wear This
A Beribboned Ballet Flat From Brooklyn’s Salter House
Salter House, a home goods and clothing store-slash-cafe that opened on Atlantic Avenue in Brooklyn in 2018, is largely credited for bringing the French Plasticana gardening shoe to the streets of New York. Acolytes have been known to style the recycled-plastic-and-hemp slip-ons with the brand’s “Picnic at Hanging Rock”-esque nightdresses and bloomers, inspired by a mix of Indian and English period styles. Now, the shop’s co-founder Sandeep Salter is adding her own shoe design to the mix. This week, she released a collaboration with the New York-based footwear brand Loeffler Randall, adding her signature bows to its Leonie ballet flat. “I often wear ballet flats with my clothes because they’re the right shape and tone,” Salter explains, alluding to the soft, off-duty nature of the look. For inspiration, she turned to her favorite children’s book, “The Twelve Dancing Princesses,” specifically the hand-drawn ribbons throughout. “I like the way that fabric is rendered in this book,” Salter says. “It’s crinkly and disheveled and a little bit off, like it’s just been scrunched up.” Although the shoes coincide with a peak moment for bows, Salter has been drawing them for years. The flats, which have an elastic strap you can tuck in, currently come in ballet pink and black moire embroidered with Salter’s illustrations. On the day we met, the designer was wearing loafers, patiently awaiting the arrival of her creation. “Then I’ll wear them all day, every day,” she says. $275, salter.house.
Since its opening over two decades ago in San Francisco (first in the Pacific Heights neighborhood before moving to its current Jackson Square location), the three-Michelin-starred restaurant Quince has come to set the standard for fine dining in the city. But its owners, the chef Michael Tusk and his wife, Lindsay, aren’t ones to coast on reputation. The couple — who also run the more casual Cotogna, next door — spent the majority of last year renovating Quince’s interiors for its 20th anniversary, giving the space a brighter, lighter atmosphere, and commissioned new artwork that includes a large-scale botanical mural from the Parisian painter Galatée Martin. Another upgrade? A new set of custom steak knives with curved brass handles, designed in collaboration with the artisan knife-maker Everett Noel, who’s based in the Sierra Foothills in rural Northern California. “Everett knew exactly what we were looking for,” says Michael. “The handle plays off the brass elements of our tables and dining room, and the feel is wonderfully heavy.” Brass, unlike wood, will also patina with age. Quince guests who wish to take the knives home with them need not resort to thievery: They’re available to purchase, along with a larger chef’s knife, also designed by Noel. $470 for a steak knife, $990 for a chef’s knife; everettnoelknives.com.
