![\"New](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/6a558fddd41e68042b341a59245bd16bac-cafe-Gitane.rsquare.w700.jpg\")
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\n Cafe Gitane\u2019s Nolita dining room.
\n Photo: Yadid Levy\/Anzenberger\/Redux\n <\/p>\n
In its 1990s heyday, Cafe Gitane<\/a> was an impossibly hip place where it wasn\u2019t uncommon to run into David Bowie or Helena Christensen during brunch. Opened by Luc L\u00e9vy, a former cabdriver from Paris by way of Casablanca, the Nolita cafeteria remained a regular stop for celebrities \u2014 sightings of Michelle Williams and Spike Jonze were reported into the 2010s \u2014 as well as, as this magazine once put it,\u00a0\u201cother people with lots of free time to steal glances at each other.\u201d Its luster had faded in recent years, but last December the Times declared<\/a> the \u201cintimidatingly cool canteen\u201d was \u201cback on the scene again.\u201d (The headline labeled the restaurant \u201ca vanguard of cool.\u201d) The occasion was a party for a book about the caf\u00e9 written by its young general manager, Isobel Lola Brown, whom L\u00e9vy credited with bringing a new generation of young customers \u2014 presumably with lots of free time to steal glances \u2014 back to the restaurant. One guest even went so far as to boldly proclaim that \u201cGitane is the new Fanelli\u2019s<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n It sounds as if it might not be on the scene much longer: At both the original Mott Street location and a second outpost in Vinegar Hill, current and former employees allege L\u00e9vy has neglected to pay them. They report falling behind three to five paychecks \u2014 and have heard that some of their co-workers are owed even more. The situation is hardly a secret: Among staff, and with L\u00e9vy, they\u2019ve talked and texted about the money they\u2019re owed, some of which, it\u2019s been said, runs up to tens of thousands of dollars. When they do get paid, employees say the money comes in dribs and drabs.<\/p>\n It was only after her book\u2019s publication, Brown tells me, that she found out about the restaurant\u2019s alleged financial troubles, which unspooled after she said she learned a co-worker was owed thousands. She eventually confronted L\u00e9vy over the debts and quit the restaurant. \u201cGitane was always such a vibrant place with incredible people. It\u2019s really sad all of this happened, and it was really painful to watch my co-workers and friends be mistreated and afraid to ask for their money,\u201d says Brown, who started working at the restaurant as a teenager. \u201cI tried to stand up for people, but was also dealing with it myself, you know. I also loved Gitane so much and was really heartbroken to leave on that note \u2014 and I felt really blindsided.\u201d<\/p>\n L\u00e9vy did not respond to my requests to talk, but multiple other people say the situation has become untenable.\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s not my first time working in a restaurant, but I could sort of describe it as the Brandy Melville of restaurants, if you know what I mean,\u201d says Bridgette, who asked to go by a pseudonym because she says she is still owed money. (Several more employees asked to speak anonymously for similar reasons.) \u201cThere was a lot of favoritism, and the whole thing about being a cute Gitane girl and whatever. That\u2019s all fun, but it\u2019s not fun when you run out of contacts and you have to wear your glasses, and then you get moved to the Brooklyn location and you make less in tips.\u201d<\/p>\n Another said that as things went downhill \u2014 before L\u00e9vy allegedly fell behind on checks entirely \u2014 pandemonium would accompany paydays as staff would fetch their checks from the office. \u201cHe was writing checks for the whole staff, and they were all bouncing, so people were trying to scramble and cash their checks first because it was such a fucking mess,\u201d this employee claims. (Others say their checks bounced too.) One former barista says that when he complained about not getting paid about a month into the job, co-workers were nonchalant and not surprised. One says it had taken months \u2014 plural \u2014 to get paid.<\/p>\n Some people have quit, but other employees have continued to work despite allegedly being owed thousands of dollars. Why? There\u2019s plenty of speculation among the former workers: Gitane has always had a reputation for hiring mostly young, attractive women \u2014 one ex-employee said that at 26 she was \u201colder\u201d for the place \u2014 some of whom are working their first job. Others from the restaurant guess that the younger employees get financial help from family. \u201cI think it is such a different relationship to money when you\u2019re not like, Oh, fuck, how am I going to feed myself tonight? I don\u2019t have my paycheck,\u201d the former barista says. \u201cIt\u2019s like, Oh, how am I going to buy my third gram of cocaine tonight if I don\u2019t get my paycheck?\u201d<\/p>\n Still, others suggest that workers are willing to stay because of Gitane\u2019s reputation as cushy and cool \u2014 though some say even that history is tough to reconcile with the current day-to-day. \u201cMaybe back in the day when they said that, whatever, Bowie was going there, maybe it had some capital, but now it\u2019s just rich Realtors who live in Soho and tourists and all these people acting like it\u2019s some big deal,\u201d the ex-worker tells me. \u201cNot that I\u2019m the arbiter of what\u2019s a big deal. It\u2019s just funny. The hiring process is so selective, and it\u2019s a shitty fucking restaurant that doesn\u2019t pay you. It\u2019s so stupid.\u201d (Earlier this year, enough allegedly overdue paychecks piled up that there was talk among some employees of a strike, though the idea met some resistance, especially among younger co-workers.)<\/p>\n \u201cWhenever I tell people I worked there, they\u2019re always like, Oh, that\u2019s so iconic,\u201d Bridgette says. \u201cA little bit of me is like, Yeah, it was iconic, but it\u2019s not iconic to not get paid.\u201d<\/p>\n In reality, paying staff appears to be only one of Gitane\u2019s problems. Since the 2010s, the caf\u00e9 has faced several lawsuits from distributors, service providers like Con Edison, and landlords. In 2011, the landlord of the Mott Street location sued, eventually winning a judgment \u2014 seven years later \u2014\u00a0of $810,110.45 in unpaid rent and other costs, interest, and attorney fees. In 2015, a landlord at 270 Lafayette Street also sued after L\u00e9vy defaulted on rent; the sides settled, though L\u00e9vy never opened a business in the location.<\/p>\n Purveyors have taken legal action as well: The specialty food distributor Dairyland sued for $94,995.89 in 2016. Ridge Produce sued both the Mott Street and a Jane Hotel offshoot to recoup unpaid invoices, winning judgments of $82,313.60 and $97,483.55, respectively, in 2019. In both cases, L\u00e9vy agreed to pay off each of the debts to Ridge Produce in monthly installments of $1,000, which will take until 2027. He has also been slapped with state tax warrants, including one for $239,205.33 (in 2017) and another for $382,781.72 (in 2021).<\/p>\n In October 2020, Gitane was sued once again by its Mott Street landlord for $474,216.76 in unpaid rent and late fees dating back to May 2019. Again, L\u00e9vy settled. The next day, he signed a lease for a space in Red Hook. Shortly after that, in March 2021, Gitane\u2019s social media announced the caf\u00e9 would expand to Venice Beach, California, too. Neither location has opened yet.<\/p>\n EAT LIKE THE EXPERTS.<\/p>\n Sign up for the Grub Street newsletter.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n