AT THE TIME, IT FELT ENTIRELY ORIGINAL, IF NOT DOWNRIGHT INCONGRUOUS
For a few days in Paris, The Beast, a barbecue meat restaurant, teamed up with a Belleville ins-titution, Thai spot Lao Siam, to offer a joint menu blending ingredients and inspirations.
It was the kind of collaboration more commonly seen in music or fashion, but in the small wor-Id of the Paris food scene, it was enough to get people talking. And yet, in practice, crowds of people showed up, intrigued and tempted by the idea of building a bridge between two wor-Ids, one forkful at a time. It was a first, and it was a smash hit.
behind this project was a young man who, after years spent in the world of alternative magazine publishing, was then taking his first steps at the helm of his agency, phamily first. that was in 2016, exactly ten years ago, and since then, julien pham has established himself as one of the most creative free spirits in the city when it comes to bringing people together around the table.
"i'm not someone who creates with my hands, and i have immense admiration for those who do. i'm drawn to what i don't know how to do. i need to surround myself with people like that."
"i like creating stories. i'm an agency: for chefs, for brands. it's a bit of a catch-all term, i do lots of different things, but my territory is food" he says with a broad smile when we meet him one spring morning, just after he hastily parks his bike against a post.
with the air of someone who seems to have an in everywhere, from the humblest hole-in-the-wall joints, like a parisian anthony bourdain, and backed by a network of friends that feels like a kind of fraternal internatio-nal where creatives of all kinds intersect, julien pham embodies a buzzing paris: a crossroads in motion, teeming with ideas, craftsmanship, and des-tinies.
through his agency, his work consistently revolves around creating unifying experiences, whether for small independent venues or major luxury powe-rhouses. a testament to his momentum, julien pham was recently com-missioned by psg to organize, on behalf of the 2025 european champion football club, a series of dinners around the world: from tokyo to los an-geles, via shanghai and london. for him, it's a perfect way to express the sense of hospitality and warmth he associates with paris, which he carries like a banner, almost as an ambassador.
"this is my playground. it's the most beautiful city in the world: the place everyone is coming to right now. it's very exciting" smiles the man in his early forties.
on the day we meet, his version of paris begins not far from his home, in the 11th arrondissement, an area that seems to act like a magnet for the rest of the city. in the shadow of a sloping street, we ring the doorbell of an otherwise unremarkable building, only to find ourselves stepping into the crooked maze of an artist's studio, where paint mingles with sawdust.
we are at the studio of the artist jean jullien. he is not only one of your regular collaborators, but also a longtime friend. and that seems to be part of what makes you distinctive since launching phamily first ten years ago: this way you have of always working with people close to you, of operating as a collective...
in reality, my circle of friends is first and foremost made up of people i met through work. they're people who stand by what i do, just as i stand by them. that's how we like to live paris. they support my work just as i support theirs. we like to lift each other up. that's how i like to live in paris. i like to say "my money is my power" and when one of my chef friends is having a tough night, i know it helps when i manage to show up with a table of five.
back when i was running a food magazine, fricote, i had noticed jean jul-lien's work as an illustrator and creator, he had notably built a huge bird-shaped installation on the thirty-second floor of a tower in nantes, with a bar set inside the animal's belly. i eventually reached out to him to design the cover of one issue of fricote. jean jullien staged a mobile phone at the table, at a time when people were just starting to photograph and post what they ordered at restaurants on social media. soon after, we quickly grew closer. i remember we went on to develop a series of exhibitions to-gether, in collaboration with the famous boutique colette, in a gallery i was running in the marais district. we called it "petit appétit" featuring works around food and the art of the table, t-shirts, and even chocolate.
when i eventually set out on the phamily first adventure, jean jullien was one of the very first people i called. i had just left my magazine, i didn't really know what i was getting into, and i asked him to design my logo. i was almost embarrassed to ask such a favor, but he fully embraced it. jean jullien is one of those people who helped me build confidence in myself.
today, we are part of the same creative community. a community that for-med naturally over time. this year, i'm celebrating the tenth anniversary of phamily first, and i realize that, broadly speaking, i've been working with the same people all along. i always end up refocusing on the people who truly matter to me, like jean jullien, but also other artists such as tyrsa and yué wu and ramy, or the chef bertrand grébaut from the restaurant sep-time. i'm not someone who creates with my hands, and i have immense admiration for those who do. i'm drawn to what i don't know how to do. i need to surround myself with people like that.
"it's no longer about adapting to paris, but about asserting where you originally come from. it's becoming increasingly creative... i think it makes paris even richer."
just a few hundred meters from jean jullien's studio, on a narrow street bathed that day in pleasant sunshine, sits a brand-new spot in the neighbo-rhood: the coffee shop tactil. with phamily first, julien pham supported the opening of this place, which is not quite like the many "specialty coffee" spots that are popping up all over the city. here, coffee isn't just an acces-sory for image or attitude, but a subtle discipline devoted to taste.
what role did you play behind the scenes in the opening of tactile ?
when i started phamily first, i didn't really know what it was supposed to be. i moved forward step by step, guided by instinct. at first, there was event production, and then, over time, i developed a consulting activity in com-munication and strategy for places connected to the restaurant world. it felt natural, since i came from the magazine industry and was already, by definition, in contact with venues and brands.
here at tactile, i notably helped the team refine their identity by calling on my friend tyrsa to create a distinctive visual language, from the logo to the menu. more broadly, i provide ongoing support. i give advice on specific points. i also reassure people. in fact, i'm like a toolbox.
tactile is a high-end, precise coffee shop. while it may seem like a new coffee shop is opening every week in paris, pierre de chanterac, the man behind the place, does things differently. he is uncompromising when it comes to coffee, and with him, the term "specialty coffee" is, for once, not overused. pierre is an experienced barista, a multiple-time french champion and also a world champion. he works with a roaster based in the south of france who has been awarded meilleur ouvrier de france, as well as another, the american scott rao, who is a global coffee legend. he even makes cocktails: an irish coffee using a whisky produced in france, domaine des hautes glaces, and espresso martinis made not with vodka, but with a eau-de-vie from brittanny in western france. that's exactly why i wanted to be part of the tactile adventure!
as julien pham hops back onto his bike, we continue our wanderings on foot. our next stop also lies within the same perimeter, this pocket of the 11th arrondissement that feels a bit like the home turf of the founder of phamily first. walking up rue du chemin vert, we eventually come across the striking green storefront of enseignes brillo, with its charming, old-fashioned look, almost like a movie set.
"that kind of rigidity is exactly what we're trying to break at chop chop. here, we take the pres-sure off wine... it proves that you don't need to go to a three-star michelin restaurant to drink good wine."
paul boinot and louis lepais, the founders of enseignes brillo, are also close collaborators of phamily first. with them, it's a kind of old-world tradition being brought back into style...
recently, i produced a dinner event at the bistrot de paris, a historic res-taurant on the left bank. for the occasion, i told myself it wouldn't feel right to decorate the storefront with custom stickers, like i sometimes do when organizing events. the bistrot de paris is a place rooted in tradition. so i thought i could create hand-painted lettering on the window to announce the dinner. it felt logical, natural. i like doing things that are in tune with a certain spirit. so i called on enseignes brillo.
since launching in 2021, louis and paul have developed an extremely beautiful and delicate hand-crafted technique. they paint directly onto storefronts, but also create traditional signage. they design logos and vi-sual identities more broadly. with them, anything is possible.
paul and louis are modernizing old techniques. they work with gold leaf gilding and acid etching. they paint onto heat-treated surfaces or rough plaster, places where standard stickers simply won't adhere. sometimes, they even find themselves painting on large-scale construction sites, sus-pended dozens of meters in the air on a lift. and they work just as much for neighborhood shops as they do for major luxury brands.
for a while, because of digital design, painted signage had fallen out of favor. but today, it's making a comeback, it's trendy again. in paris, it has even become something of a norm for human-scale businesses, whether it's a bakery or a small neighborhood restaurant.
whenever i can, i call paul and louis to work on a storefront. it would be easier to produce stickers, but that's not what i want. i want things to be beautiful, to be rooted in a story, in craftsmanship.
just a little further down the street, heading toward the marais, the vibrant colors of a logo designed by enseignes brillo spread across the window of a bánh mì restaurant. it's a detail initiated by julien pham, who has long been a regular at the place, run by angela, the larger-than-life owner.
banh-mi may not be the most talked-about restaurant in paris, but for you, it's a place close to your heart. why is that?
before moving here, angela and the other owners were set up on a very small, busy street in the neighborhood. it wasn't really a restaurant: it was more like a closet where they were turning out vietnamese sandwiches one after another. i used to go there all the time because, at the time, i wor-ked just nearby. then one day, they told me they were selling. they ended up moving here, into what used to be a men's underwear shop.
at first, angela struggled. the location was great, but strangely, even though the restaurant offered very good products, customers were few and far between. i wanted to help her. for my 40th birthday, i asked my friends to pool money together so we could pay for a logo for her. so it was the guys from enseignes brillo who designed and painted the "banh-mi" sign for banh-mi. it's a logo that makes you want to walk in, i think. i hope it's played a small part in the fact that people are now coming.
this place is a perfect illustration of how the different waves of immigration in paris have ultimately expressed their identity through food. it's happe-ning more and more, and it's invigorating. it's no longer about adapting to paris, but about asserting where you originally come from. it's becoming increasingly creative, and you can see it in music and fashion as well. i think it makes paris even richer.
as for me, it was vietnamese food culture, the one i grew up with in my fa-mily, that made me want to work in the food world. today, whenever i can, i try to build bridges between my work and my parents' home country. it's part of my search for identity. i even opened a phamily first office in ho chi minh city.
the last place julien pham takes us to is both an achievement and an an-chor point. located right next to the famous parisian theater le splendid, the restaurant chop chop is none other than his own: a crossroads of all the experiences and desires he has gathered over time. with its tiny kitchen and just a handful of tables, the space may not look like much. but come evening, along rue du faubourg saint-martin, where every possible atmos-phere collides, it becomes a world unto itself, drawing in people from every horizon, each carrying a thousand different passions. this is julien pham's paris.
"when i eventually set out on the phamily first adventure, i didn't really know what i was get-ting into... jean jullien is one of those people who helped me build confidence in myself. today, we are part of the same creative community. a community that formed naturally over time."
why, when you were already so busy with all the activities of phamily first, did you feel the need to open a restaurant?
when we opened chop chop, we were complete amateurs. proof of that, we installed this white floor, slippery and totally unsuitable for a restaurant. we also have wine-tasting glasses like the ones used by winemakers, not proper wine glasses. out in the suburbs, we picked up a large refrigerator from a salvage warehouse where restaurants that are closing get rid of their furniture. at its core, chop chop is a real patchwork of odds and ends.
on the wall, there are three framed pieces like the ones you find in noodle shops in vietnam. i had them made in the name of chop chop when i was traveling there. they're good-luck charms.
chop chop is a passion project. with my two partners, rami and ismaël, we'll never make money from this restaurant. we simply wanted a place of our own to create experiences that wouldn't necessarily be possible elsewhere. it's a place of blending, first of all because rami is of sene-galese origin, ismaël is moroccan, and i'm vietnamese.
we give the space over to chefs whose cuisines aren't always the most visible. it's a springboard for emerging chefs who have energy to spare. i feel like it's my role now to create opportunities. it's not a gimmick, it's sincere.
every month, there's a new chef. we've invited chefs working with west african cuisine, others from india. there was this chef from london, of nige-rian and italian origin. these are people with singular stories that they try to translate onto the plate.
and chop chop is also a safe space when it comes to wine. i'll always re-member the first times i ordered wine in traditional restaurants, i was ner-vous, afraid of making the wrong choice, of being judged. that kind of ri-gidity is exactly what we're trying to break at chop chop. here, we take the pressure off wine. that's why we only serve natural wine-it's wine for eve-ryone, with no chemicals, better for the planet. it's a very inclusive, open-minded approach that we fully embrace. it proves that you don't need to go to a three-star michelin restaurant to drink good wine.
Locations
Jean Jullien's studio
Tactile Café
164 Avenue Ledru Rollin 75011
Enseignes Brillo
100 Rue du Chemin Vert, 75011
Chop Chop Love
48 Rue du Faubourg Saint-Martin, 75010
Angela Banh Mi
81 R. de Turbigo, 75003
