On September 4, Manhattan’s Financial District will welcome a new kind of temple—though its stained glass is replaced with patterned tile, and its incense arrives in the form of mezcal smoke. Mexi on Stone Street opens in a 17th-century landmark building, bringing with it a devotion to agave, Mexican cuisine, and a design vocabulary that could have been lifted from the colonial homes of Mérida.
The project comes from WF Hospitality, the team behind The Bedford and Mexi Brooklyn, and it is being described less as a restaurant and more as a “deep exploration” of Mexican spirits and food culture. In practice, that means over 400 bottles of mezcal, tequila, raicilla, and bacanora behind the bar, each one carefully sourced, and a kitchen where tortillas are nixtamalized and pressed by hand daily from imported organic heirloom corn masa.
A Cathedral to Agave
If you trace the story back, Mexi is an extension of a movement—an attempt to pull the full, messy, aromatic reality of Mexico into New York without translation. The beverage program is led by José María “Chema” Dondé, a Mexico City native whose résumé includes Cosme, Claro, Dante, and Maison Premiere. He’s also the founder of Panorama Mezcal, which for more than a decade has functioned as a kind of salon for agave enthusiasts.
At Mexi, Chema has assembled one of the most ambitious agave lists in the United States. There are small-production bottlings from Oaxaca, Durango, Guerrero, and Jalisco—spirits that carry with them the fingerprint of individual mezcaleros. The cocktail menu is constructed as a deck of Mexican lotería cards. Each drink, from La Chona to El Drácula to La Condesa, comes with its own illustrated card and tasting notes, turning the act of ordering a round into a kind of game, a ritual both playful and reverent.
Food as an Act of Memory
The kitchen is overseen by Chef Jose Luis Dominguez, a Puebla native whose food carries the weight of family recipes layered with the precision of fine dining. Dominguez trained under Richard Sandoval at Maya and Pampano, and at Mexi he is cooking in a way that’s both grounded and expansive: slow-cooked carnitas, chicken tinga, salsas that change with the seasons, signature moles, and desserts like churros dusted with cinnamon sugar and paired with dipping sauces that border on the devotional.
Every dish begins with what WF Hospitality calls an “everything made from scratch” philosophy, whether that means hand-ground adobo or sauces built slowly from chipotle and ancho peppers. The result is food that insists on authenticity while allowing room for invention.
Design Rooted in the Yucatán
The space itself could be read as a love letter to Mérida: reclaimed wood, custom ironworks, vibrant facades, and Catholic iconography folded discreetly into the décor. It is atmospheric without being theatrical, an environment where a glass of mezcal feels like a sacrament.
The Team Behind the Vision
WF Hospitality co-founders Sean Rawlinson and Daddo Bogich partnered with Paul Lamas (The Dead Rabbit) and Peter Poulakakos (Harry’s, The Dead Rabbit) to create Mexi. Between them, the group has decades of experience in building hospitality concepts across New York.
Mexi Hours, Location, and What to Expect
Mexi is open Tuesday through Sunday, 3 p.m. to 11 p.m., at 57 Stone Street, New York, NY 10004. Reservations and updates can be found on the restaurant’s website.
What they’ve created is not just another Financial District opening, but something rarer: a space where the story of agave, told bottle by bottle, dish by dish, is allowed to speak in its own voice.
