A sprawling casino-hotel complex is worlds away from New York’s SoHo. No matter: The Corner Store’s new Las Vegas outpost has all the allure and sophistication of its Big Apple original – just dialed up a notch for Sin City.
Rockwell Group has successfully adapted the DNA of the original instant-hit destination that opened in 2024. Firm partner Shawn Sullivan and his team took a sensory-rich approach to nostalgia-tinged luxury, building on a handful of previous collaborations with Catch Hospitality Group, including The Eighty Six, Or’esh, and Cafe Charmant in New York.
The Corner Store Las Vegas, with its dark burl wood paneling and small-for-Vegas 180-seat capacity, deftly balances the theatrical and the intimate. This next iteration of The Corner Store is intended and bound to draw bold-faced-name clientele like its predecessor as another clubby retreat in a wildly different context that presents a fresh homage to an old school style of social dining. Here’s what to expect.
Wallpaper* dines at The Corner Store Las Vegas
The mood: Old School New York meets the Orient Express
A series of gently-illuminated, wood-framed vitrines outfitted with velvet curtains and punctuated by Art Deco-inspired sconces hints at what lies behind The Corner Store Las Vegas’ exterior. Rockwell Group’s flair for the dramatic and glamorous transitions to the interior’s multiple contiguous rooms, starting in the vestibule.
Turning right leads into the main bar, wider than its two-year-old Manhattan predecessor, and sets the stage for sophisticated Vegas revelry. Chequerboard marble floors, antique mirrored surfaces with tile-surround detail, more lavish wood paneling, niche banquettes and glass lighting create a universally flattering setting. This room also showcases an acoustic ceiling installation, featuring tan-hued panels framed with wood mouldings, that conquers what can be a bête noire for hospitality designers. In the martini bar and bar dining area, more glam fixtures and ambient cove lighting illuminate the restaurant’s collection of vintage photography documenting celebrity revelry, with vignettes from New York in the ‘80s appearing frequently.
If you can’t secure a ticket for the Orient Express, consider lingering in The Corner Store’s main dining room or private dining rooms instead. A pair of wide, generously sized, back-to-back curved wood-frame banquettes anchors the former, and other built-in seating features striped upholstery over carpeting that adds visual layers while stopping short of maximalism. Green velvet ceiling panels are another practically undetectable acoustical trick that doesn’t detract from the handsome custom armchairs upholstered in leather and cut velvet.
All the world is a stage, and The Corner Store is especially a stage for the social media age, so more arches with curtains hint at see-and-be-seen impulses and reflect Rockwell Group’s set design expertise. Meanwhile, the firm is well-versed in accommodating the glitterati’s respectful privacy, too. (There’s a separate entrance to the private dining room that lets certain customers bypass the publicly visible spaces entirely.)
The food: Playfully deluxe American classics
The well-edited menu is a snapshot of what chef/partner Michael Vignola describes as ‘our ode to New York. It’s classic food done well.’ Vignola and executive chef Daniel Bernardo put their spin on upscale comfort foods, ratcheting up sentimental favourites without reinventing the wheel while having some decadent fun in the process.
Petite lobster rolls, eaten in one or two bites depending on your ambition, come topped with caviar (of course). The fancy version of childhood-favourite pizza rolls is handmade and filled with five cheeses, and the French dip is assembled from thinly sliced, heavily marbled Westholme Australian wagyu beef. Spinach and artichoke dip, served with fresh tortilla chips and relatively virtuous celery and carrot sticks, is a natural accompaniment to easy, lively conversation. These noshes form an appropriately casual yet elevated foundation for The Corner Store’s martini-focused cocktail program, an irreverent nod to tradition. Savoury-forward signatures like Oli’s Dirty, with caviar-stuffed olives, and the Sour Cream & Onion, capped with a whisper of froth from the green onion-infused, fat-washed Condesa gin, might prompt Dorothy Parker to raise an eyebrow with an admixture of skepticism and admiration.
The Sour Cream & Onion martini, capped with a whisper of froth from the green onion-infused, fat-washed Condesa gin, might prompt Dorothy Parker to raise an eyebrow
Much like the interconnected, lavishly appointed rooms, where the lighting and views of fellow diners are calibrated just so, dinner unfolds in a sequence that builds on each component. (The Corner Store Vegas follows the model of the New York original and is an evening-only affair.) Lighter warm-up bites come in the form of seasonal crudos, in this case hamachi layered with compressed watermelon and bathed in ponzu. All but the dairy-averse are then wise to share another Corner Store staple, the Caesar salad that comes studded with everything-bagel croutons and cream cheese-filled croquettes, blanketed with a generous sprinkling of freshly grated Parmesan.
Hearty mains and a robust steak roster are what you hope for when immersed in this aesthetic milieu. A centre-cut prime New York strip comes sliced and coated in a mild au poivre sauce with just enough bite, alongside platonic-ideal crispy fries. Other steak cuts span the spectrum from filet mignon to the primal wagyu tomahawk, all specified with their sourcing credentials. (Additional larger beef items are in the works as Las Vegas-exclusive offerings, including custom cuts from Taylor Sheridan’s 6666 Ranch.) Grilled branzino over a bed of wilted spinach and tomatoes, whole Dover sole, and salmon satisfy pescatarians, and a plant-based chicken parm ensures vegetarians don’t feel relegated to starters and sides (not that there’s anything wrong with that here).
The culinary team’s sweets prove the utter ridiculousness of the phrase ‘save room for dessert.’ This is a course you absolutely should and will enjoy, regardless of what’s come before. Case in point: the soft-serve sundae with coconut, Valrhona chocolate fudge drizzle, shortbread crumble and caramel components that riff on Girl Scout Samoas cookies, which, if we’re being honest, always fall short of expectations. (That said, here’s a PSA to buy cookies to support your hardworking local troop) The high fat content of the coconut ice cream base lets it hold up as your eating pace slows, which happens when the best imaginable version of fast-food-inspired apple hand pies appears. Slices of a compressed pineapple palate cleanser make the rounds just in time for a last espresso martini.
The Corner Store is located at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas, 3708 S. Las Vegas Blvd., Las Vegas, Nevada