INTERVIEW: JESSICA SIMMONS + NOAH GANHÃO
PHOTOS: NOUR ABBOUD
Ashley and Dylan are husband and wife, business partners and best friends behind Toronto’s Juice (hair salon, café, bar) and Cafeteria (club, event space, gallery). They share their unabashed take on work, play and soon-to-be parenthood.
NOAH GANHÃO: We’re at the back of Inter Steer Tavern, it’s 6:15, Dylan and Ashley are looking hot. What are you drinking?
DYLAN CIMINI: Maybe a beer. Looks fun inside there.
NOAH: [Laughs] Looking like Bonitos if they had a pool table.
JESSICA SIMMONS: Now we know where the inspiration came from.
DYLAN: Always comes from somewhere.
NOAH: What’s Cafeteria’s inspiration? What are places you guys like or pull references from?
DYLAN: Honestly we don’t really pull much, we’re pretty original.
ASHLEY COSTA: I feel like with Cafeteria, it was moreso just collaborating with what the space looked like.
NOAH: The building definitely has a lot of character. Did anyone work on renovating it with you?
ASHLEY: It’s us and Studio AC, who also designed Juice. They actually designed Andrea’s Cookies too.
NOAH: The curved counter should’ve given it away. [Laughs]
DYLAN: I know, it’s very Juice-esque.
ASHLEY: It was Reza. He used to work at Studio AC. Now he has Sheep Studio, which is super sick. So he’s more community focused…
JESS: What was the process with Caf?
NOAH: Basically, you guys walked into a convenience store, saw the security mirror in the corner and thought, “we’re gonna throw up a bunch of these and install red lights” …and smoke machines—Jess’ favourite feature.
DYLAN: Hilarious. Yeah… It was just the floors. The floors were like a mall, and your [Ashley’s] idea was strip mall, and yeah convex mirrors?
ASHLEY: Yeah… you know those Chinese strip malls? Those were the inspo.
NOAH: I like that… very liminal.
JESS: And you kept some of the original parts of it… the kitchen, bar…
ASHLEY: Yeah, practically everything is original but the seating.
DYLAN: We barely touched it. Perimeter seating and those triangles. That’s how it should be, right?
One, the building’s coming down and two, the building was there for so long and served so many purposes. Why the fuck are we going to go and change it and demolish just to recreate some stupid arches and fucking this and that?
NOAH: Clearly the Portuguese know how to set up an event hall.
ASHLEY: That’s true.
DYLAN: Yeah, also, no one cares.
NOAH: What’s it say in the front? Was it the old club motto on the ground?
DYLAN: Sporting Club of Toronto.
NOAH: I’m team Porto. Ashley, what was your club growing up?
ASHLEY: Sporting.
DYLAN: That’s how we saw it.
ASHLEY: It’s so crazy. When we got the space, my dad was just like, holy shit. And then Sporting actually won that year, too.
NOAH: Love that. When did you get it?
ASHLEY: Last year.
NOAH: Right, because you [Jess] went there for Halloween last year…
JESS: Yeah, I had been to a couple of parties before it officially opened…
ASHLEY: We were throwing sneaky little parties. There was nothing in there at the time—no heat, no HVAC, no nothing—it was cold as fuck.
JESS: Halloween upstairs was the first one. New Year’s was still unofficially open but the downstairs was ready.
NOAH: Smoke machines in?
JESS: Nope. Whose idea was the smoke machine anyways?
ASHLEY: Gary, our business partner. He loves them.
NOAH: Is Gary in on Juice as well?
ASHLEY: No, Gary owns Invisible City.
DYLAN: Juice is just us. No funding… open to funding though… selling drugs… organs… anything.
JESS: [Laughs] So, how’d your relationship with Gary come about? What made you go into business together?
DYLAN: Because we threw all our offsite parties with Gary.
ASHLEY: And Gary’s really well known in the music scene. He’s fucking sick.
DYLAN: He has the label Invisible City… and I don’t know, one random night we were looking for a new space, and I just went to Gary and asked, “hey, you want to open up a club?” He’s like, “yeah.” And I was like “alright.” [Laughs]
NOAH: You didn’t have the space yet?
ASHLEY: No, no, we were looking at a space beside Juice. We wanted to do something fun there—different vibe though.
DYLAN: Oh yeah, the Dovercourt one… it’s Alter Spa now. It used to be the old Track and Field. Would have been so fucking expensive though.
ASHLEY: Yeah, the rent was stupid.
NOAH: So you got the current spot on Dupont spot last year instead and then opened officially at the beginning of this summer?
DYLAN: Yeah, Cafeteria opened in May. Juice in 2018.
NOAH: So when did you two meet?
ASHLEY: In 2016, when I moved back from London. I cut his hair. I actually worked at a barber shop at the time and Dylan’s barber went to Barcelona or something… the rest is history.
NOAH: So he just kept getting haircuts?
DYLAN: Basically [laughs]. Every week and every day.
JESS: He was your best customer.
ASHLEY: For sure.
DYLAN: Here’s me breathing on the window, “Oh, hey. Want a coffee?”
NOAH: *Draws heart* The tips got increasingly larger I hope.
ASHLEY: He never tipped me… [laughs] I’m kidding.
DYLAN: Have you read The Game [The Game: Penetrating the Secret Society of Pickup Artists]? Keep ‘em guessing.
NOAH: Ever cut Ashley’s hair?
ASHLEY: Yeah, he’s actually coloured it.
DYLAN: I’ve done it a few times… I learn through osmosis. I just kind of pick things up, you know?
JESS: How far into dating did you start thinking about opening a place?
DYLAN: Two weeks probably. Okay no… the second date [laughs]. I just wanted a business, I thought this was a business meeting the whole time. I thought this is what business partners did.
ASHLEY: We were both at a point in our lives where we were wanting something different, but didn’t know what the fuck we wanted to do.
NOAH: So, what were you [Dylan] doing at that point?
DYLAN: Panhandling. [Laughs]
NOAH: That’s a charming look for you.
DYLAN: I was in the, uh, organ trade… on the record. If you’d like to donate your organs, I’ll happily take them. In addition to any catering opportunities, please come to me… 647xxxxxx7. Again that is 647xxxxxx7.
ASHLEY: Oh my God.
DYLAN: Um, what was I doing… I was… [laughs] I hate talking about it. I was in New York for four years, I played soccer, blah, blah, blah… I was overseas. I was in Italy for two years.
NOAH: For soccer?
DYLAN: Yeah. Then I got injured and came back. I did some corporate shit… *voice trails off*
ASHLEY: *Mumbles and jokingly mocks Dylan.* Why are you talking so low?
DYLAN: Cause I don’t like talking about it. That was a past life.
JESS: So you had a 9 to 5 corporate job?
ASHLEY: Yeah. He made bank.
DYLAN: I did make a lot of money.
JESS: Making money for someone else is so different from now running your own business…
DYLAN: Yeah. But I wasn’t going to do that forever. I would rather panhandle.
JESS: Did you always know you wanted to open some place of your own?
DYLAN: No.
NOAH: He obviously wanted to be a soccer player until he got wounded…
DYLAN: [Laughs] Yeah, I wanted to be a soccer player until I died… went through a crazy fucking depression…
NOAH: A classic plight; Canadian Euro boy wants to go to the show in Europe.
DYLAN: Yeah, I went to the show! Signed a pro contract, everything.
NOAH: Who’d you play for?
DYLAN: It was a farm team from Pescara. We played Serie C with Francavilla… and then the dream died.
NOAH: How old were you?
DYLAN: 21.
NOAH: Favourite soccer player?
DYLAN: Me. [Laughs]
ASHLEY: The first time I ever went to one of Dylan’s games, when we started dating, it was so fucking embarrassing because he was trying to fight his own goalie.
DYLAN: No… I was just swearing at him… he wouldn’t give me the ball… all he had to do was give me the ball.
ASHLEY: There was another team that was ready to go on after them and everyone’s just talking shit about him and there’s me with my little bag and I’m so embarrassed. Never doing this again.
DYLAN: So I can’t play men’s league.
NOAH: Did you play soccer too Ash?
ASHLEY: Yeah but not pro like him. We actually played co-ed together for a sec.
NOAH: That’s fun—Caf needs a team.
ASHLEY: We’d kill it. I love it, it’s so fun. I haven’t played in a minute.
NOAH: On the note of Portuguese prerequisites, did you ever dance in the rancho [Portuguese folk dance group]?
ASHLEY: No but I dressed up. My family’s from Brampton so we did Our Lady of Fatima in Brampton—that’s the Portuguese church—big, big community. We would do that walking thing and they dressed me up as an angel. It was so cute. We would do stuff like that… I was in Portuguese school—I used to speak fluent Portuguese, then my grandmother passed away and I kind of lost it.
NOAH: Do you still understand it?
ASHLEY: Yeah, I feel like if I chilled in Portugal for a month, I’d be fluent.
NOAH: Have you guys been?
ASHLEY: I have. My grandma’s from São Miguel.
NOAH: Oh nice, Açores—I’ve never been to the islands.
JESS: When’s the last time you went?
ASHLEY: Long time ago. But Dylan called me today and said, “we should move there.”
DYLAN: If you’re under 35, you save, like 70% of your taxes and only pay like 30%. Fuck, live there for a year and you’re set.
ASHLEY: Portugal is wild… the clubs stay open until like, 6am. Crazy.
JESS: Where in Portugal would you go?
DYLAN: Doesn’t matter, anywhere. Spend one year there and then go somewhere else.
JESS: Where after?
ASHLEY: Milan in like 10 seconds.
NOAH: And the businesses?
DYLAN: They’ll die. We don’t believe in spaces that go beyond the person.
NOAH: I mean Caf is already a finite project, right? That’s going to be a few years, then the space will become lofts and you’ll move to something else.
DYLAN: Yeah, disposable.
NOAH: Kind of liberating. On another note, Portuguese and Italian restaurants… do you go much? I find I don’t go to many Portuguese spots so it’s tough when people ask me for recos.
ASHLEY: Me and Dylan are regulars at [Churrasqueira] Martins. That’s where we do all of our business meetings—it’s so sick. All the old middle-aged Portuguese men doing business and stuff.
NOAH: That’s on Rogers right?
ASHLEY: Yeah. It’s always slammed. The food is absolutely insane.
DYLAN: Sundays after two if you really want the heavy hitters in the kitchen. We know the schedule.
NOAH: What do you order?
ASHLEY: That’s hard… we get the white cheese—you have to. We get the mussels and the clams—no, tiger shrimps actually. They’re fire.
DYLAN: Yeah the tiger shrimp is a new one—it’s really good, they’re huge.
ASHLEY: Yeah they’re massive. They’re big and butterery and spicy and sexy. Mhm.
DYLAN: *In a Portuguese accent* Uhh, vinho roche, frango, bitoque, uhhh pastel de natas!
ASHLEY: I’m fucking dead. Uh, we don’t eat at Italian spots.
DYLAN: No Italian stuff is all washed. Portugal is next. The Portuguese spots that you know and love, they’re gonna be gone before you know it. Happens all the time.
ASHLEY: No, Martins will be there for a while. Oh yeah Chiado is really good but it’s expensive. We’ve only been once but best octopus I’ve ever had in my life.
NOAH: Love grilled octopus. My Avó makes arroz de polvo [octopus rice] every Christmas, brings it out at midnight, and it’s delicious although off the record, I’m definitely not hungry at that point—Avó I love you.
JESS: Dylan, I know you’re the cook at home, what are you cooking?
DYLAN: Everything, I’m the best.
ASHLEY: Yeah, he actually is. Yesterday he made, what do you call it?
DYLAN: Pasta e lenticchie. It’s like lentils, then we didn’t have guanciale so I used potato to thicken it up. Yeah I’m ridiculous.
NOAH: You’re a whiz… where’d this come from? Just cooking often?
DYLAN: Osmosis. I just walk by these people and it just absorbs. I’m like a sponge, somehow, I don’t know. This figure just comes to me and says, “hey, Dylan, this would be fucking phenomenal if you did this.”
ASHLEY: When he doesn’t try, his food’s really good but when he tries too hard sometimes…
DYLAN: Get the fuck out of here. No chance. [Laughs] It’s because your expectations go way up.
NOAH: You just want some simple eggs.
ASHLEY: Oh, I can’t eat eggs, babe. The baby does not like eggs. I projectile vomited last week before work. It was crazy.
NOAH: I heard you [Dylan] were startled last week when you saw you were having a girl.
ASHLEY: Oh, my God, so funny.
DYLAN: No, no I was shocked.
NOAH: Allegedly you fell asleep.
DYLAN: That was shock. It’s not alleged, I did fall asleep.
ASHLEY: It’s like he saw a fucking ghost. It was crazy.
DYLAN: Yeah, because I didn’t grow up with girls—I didn’t have any sisters or young girl cousins. When this happened and we saw girl, the first moment was like, one; this is going against everything I know and two; I fast forward to her crying with breakups and shit like that.
ASHLEY: She’s not gonna go to you though, I never went to my dad.
DYLAN: She’ll probably come to me. Anyways, I don’t know, clearly. And then I’m walking her down the aisle and then she’s taking care of us when we’re old…
NOAH: Do we have name ideas for sweet baby girl?
DYLAN: Esmeralda.
ASHLEY: Do you remember that show, Esmeralda?! Every time I talk about it, everyone is like, what the fuck? That sounds so hot. I’m just like, I used to watch that when I was a little kid with my grandmother, like Esmeraldaaaa *singing*. I love that show. Spanish soap opera.
NOAH: Just don’t pick a name that anyone can drive; you know, Mercedes, things like that… I don’t think they inspire good things.
ASHLEY: We have names that we like…
DYLAN: Like Volvo.
ASHLEY: Or Golf.
JESS: How do you think your dogs are going to feel about adding a baby into the picture?
ASHLEY: My dogs are already licking my stomach.
NOAH: Any kicks yet?
ASHLEY: Yeah actually, I felt my first kick yesterday. I’m a sweet potato this week. It feels like butterflies or, you know, when you’re in love? It feels like that, I don’t know, it’s really cute. I can’t wait till it’s really going.
NOAH: How far along now?
ASHLEY: 20 weeks… half way I guess. Am I scared to give birth? Hell ya.
NOAH: Been practicing breathing?
ASHLEY: No, I’m holding my breath. I don’t know, man. I feel like it’s going by so fast. I have to go stroller shopping. Never in my life have I had to go stroller shopping, that’s so weird.
NOAH: Have you bought anything for her yet?
ASHLEY: No. I’m kind of waiting.
DYLAN: I want her to grow up and start knitting and sewing so she can make her own clothes.
JESS: So that’s what’s next. After Caf closes, baby clothing made by her.
NOAH: Baby by Baby.
DYLAN: Yeah, we’re making employees.
NOAH: So how many employees are you gonna have? A full starting eleven?
DYLAN: It depends on how many she can carry. [laughs]
ASHLEY: Some people are just like, “Oh my God, I love being pregnant.” I just want the baby out, so she’s just chilling with us.
DYLAN: Sweeping sometimes. Washing dishes. We can use some help. On the farm, nos Açores, they’re breeding employees. They’re breeding farmers. They needed some help on the farm and we’re just doing the same thing. So we’re not bad people.
JESS: It’s called a family business.
ASHLEY: It’s gonna be interesting putting a baby in our lifestyle, for sure. Like sleep times, feed times, all that shit. Everything’s going to be new to us, right? So I guess we just have to explore and find out.
NOAH: Are you guys currently very routine people? I feel like it’s hard to be but to some extent you have to be.
DYLAN: Yeah it’s a fucked up routine but it’s a routine..
ASHLEY: I wake up, work out, go to work…
JESS: …and your schedules are kind of opposite but you meet at certain points in the day.
DYLAN: We meet at the breakfast table, sometimes and it’s like, hey just checking in, nice to see you. Then we’ll meet at the water cooler.
JESS: Right. And then you meet at the flip of the day. You’ll be working, Dylan comes in.
ASHLEY: Yeah. And then we’ll have dinner. We always make time for each other. I feel like that’s the most important thing when you own a business with your partner. You have to make a little bit of time throughout the day.
NOAH: How do you manage that? It’s so easy to continuously bleed in to work stuff.
ASHLEY: We have Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday—well, Wednesday I cut hair but we don’t have the club open, so it’s a little bit different. We still get so much time together.
JESS: Do you have time where you just chill and not talk about work?
ASHLEY: Sundays. Phones off on Sundays and we just spend time together.
JESS: What do you do?
DYLAN: Wait for the carrier pigeon to deliver some news because we desperately need to know what’s going on. Does anyone want an event?
NOAH: Do you guys have hobbies?
ASHLEY: Nothing right now. We paint and sculpt together. What else do we do? We’re like an old couple.
NOAH: I can’t say I know many old people that sculpt…
JESS: Obviously workout classes.
ASHLEY: Yeah, I work out. Love Pilates. Pilates Princess. It’s hard to have hobbies when you’re so fucking busy. Adulting is so hard. Is cleaning my house a hobby? I need a maid.
NOAH: I do get a lot of pleasure from using my Dyson so perhaps. Are you morning people?
ASHLEY: I’m a morning person and Dylan’s a night person.
DYLAN: I don’t sleep.
ASHLEY: In the morning, I feel like I’ve had three lines of cocaine. I’m like “Dylan. Oh my God, dude, my dream was so wild. And then this happened….” He’s just waking up and hasn’t even had coffee.
DYLAN: I’m a slow riser. I used to be a morning person.
JESS: What time do you get home from Caf and what time are you waking up?
DYLAN: Home 3am, wake at 7:30/8.
JESS: You’re ready for a baby. [Laughs]
ASHLEY: Yeah, It’s gonna be good.
NOAH: Okay back to work… last time we spoke, you said that when Juice first opened, you were serving more wine, cocktails and stuff like that but now…
DYLAN: Yeah because that was hot, because no one was doing it. And then everyone started doing it, and now we’re off of it. Now divey is hot.
NOAH: So is it mainly about being the antithesis or do you just grow tired of things?
DYLAN: Because no one needs it. In this economy, no one cares, no one should care. Also unfortunately the type of people that come through don’t understand what’s good so why are we even trying this hard?
NOAH: Okay, so what’s good?
DYLAN: What’s good? You tell me. Now everyone’s doing vinyl and wine and…
NOAH: You don’t want to get in on the vinyl HiFi listening wave?
DYLAN: Yeah, exactly. It took a fucking hair salon to for the city to take sound systems seriously. You’d be surprised about the places that you love, that used to come to Juice and used to snap photos and then go do what we’re doing. And it’s like, oh man, because you have all these fucking resources and seed funding, you can do all this shit and it’s fucking bullshit. I fucking hate everything. Fuck it all. [Laughs]
I don’t want to get cancelled. But everyone does know I hate everything already.
ASHLEY: …and then everyone just assumes that I hate everybody.
DYLAN: You do hate everybody.
ASHLEY: I do. Everybody tries too hard.
DYLAN: Trying is when you just go knee deep and you don’t actually commit to something.
ASHLEY: Take XXXXXXX for instance, this guy’s buying culture and everyone’s starting to realize that.
DYLAN: But nobody cares and that’s why we don’t care about the underground.
ASHLEY: Yeah even when The Weeknd and Kaytranada came to Juice and they wanted to spin. We already had our friend Kourosh spinning—he’s a fucking sick ass DJ—so we said no.
DYLAN: Yeah, but if this was flipped, we would get tossed to the wolves in the underground. They would do anything for that clout.
ASHLEY: It was cool to see Kaytranada dancing to Kourosh’s music though.
NOAH: Yeah, I actually happened to be at Juice that night—it was the Roger’s power outage. I remember walking in and seeing Kaytranada dancing, wearing these bug-eye sunglasses—looked like he was having a time.
ASHLEY: My friend called me asking, “Hey, can you shut down Juice? The Weeknd and Kaytranada are going…” and I’m like, we’re not shutting down, we have regulars, we’re not just gonna close the bar on them.
NOAH: Has he returned?
ASHLEY: No. Anyways, I just feel like even the people that are underground want to party at mainstream places. All the DJs get excited about getting gigs at mainstream places like Bar Bowie. I’m not saying Bar Bowie is a bad place. I actually like what they’re doing. I don’t mind it.
JESS: Okay, so underground is out.
ASHLEY: Underground’s dead. So dead.
JESS: Art scene is in?
ASHLEY: Oh my gosh. Gallery. Everybody and their moms are trying to be a gallery.
NOAH: Oh yeah, you guys just joined the gallery train!
DYLAN: The gallery train. [Laughs] Can we talk about it? Fucking Cafeteria does a restaurant. XXXXXXX decides they wanted a restaurant. We started doing a fucking gallery, guess who’s fucking doing a gallery last Sunday? Like, get the fuck out of here. With all your fucking nine business partners and all your money. It’s annoying, like fuck.
ASHLEY: Don’t get me wrong, obviously we’re hopping on the gallery scene because why the fuck not? We’re too poor not to…
NOAH: You have too much space. You need to do something. I mean, I still think a dodgeball court is ideal, but…
JESS: What other ideas do you have for upstairs?
DYLAN: Nice try, Jess. You’ll have to wait and find out. No new ideas. Everything’s stale. We’re doing the same thing.
ASHLEY: Toronto’s so new. For instance, when Juice opened in 2018 people were so scared.
DYLAN: To have a multifunctional space in 2018 was fucking different.
ASHLEY: I remember cutting hair and people would open the door, close the door, open the door, close the door… or walk in and be like, “hey do you guys have juice” and we’re like, “hehe, we’re just called Juice, we just want to be ambiguous.” I feel that no one knows how to actually explore—this new generation is slowly starting to a little bit instead of just being on fucking social media because, no offense, your generation, you guys are heavy *whistles* eyes.
NOAH: Not sure who you’re looking at.
ASHLEY: You. [Laughs] It’s cool because generations change and it’s not people’s fault that the internet and everything is kind of taking over but no one just wants to explore. I feel like that’s what’s missing. You know what I mean?
NOAH: I do think there’s a lot of talk about wanting to go places and try things but often it’s just talk, or going for a photo and being like alright, I checked that off.
ASHLEY: I hate when people are like, “let’s just go and take a picture of our espresso martinis and blah, blah, blah.”—but I get it though and then it looks good for us, whatever. Anyways, this generation of partying sucks. Everyone’s on fucking K, no one drinks, we gotta bring cocaine back because everyone drinks when they’re on cocaine, you know what I mean? But it’s fucking expensive, I get it.
DYLAN: Who cares, I was fucking broke when I was going out. I was like, put my card down, start a tab, be a big dick in the room and say “shots.”
JESS: Bring back guys paying the tab.
DYLAN: Guys don’t buy girls drinks now.
NOAH: My credit card unfortunately says otherwise. [Laughs]
ASHLEY: In general, that’s what we’ve noticed. Sometimes my clients will go on a date and they have to pay or pay for half. If you ask someone on a date, you’re paying for that fucking date.
NOAH: Damn, chivalry really is dead I guess. So what’s your favourite juice?
ASHLEY: My favourite juice? Coca Cola. Nevermind that’s not juice. Fruit punch. I feel like Dylan’s not giving anything.
DYLAN: I’m not giving much. I’m just talking shit. If you’re reading this, I probably don’t like you.
NOAH: What place don’t you hate in this city?
DYLAN: [Churrasqueira] Martins. Next.
NOAH: You already said that. Pick somewhere else.
DYLAN: I like our corner store, White Corner Variety. MEP Printing.
NOAH: Have you always been sarcastic?
DYLAN: Yes.
NOAH: You should’ve said no.
ASHLEY: Where do we go? We go to Sakai.
DYLAN: We love Sakai. Put that in there.
NOAH: Is that how you found Eric, the chef at Caf?
DYLAN: Yeah, but we didn’t poach, Eric came to us.
ASHLEY: We go to Archive, Dotty’s…
DYLAN: Dotty’s is great..
NOAH: Do you guys have time in the middle of everything to watch stuff? Are you movie people, TV people…?
JESS: You were just telling me about Party Girl.
ASHLEY: We watched Party Girl for the first time. It’s so sick. It’s from 1995.
NOAH: Top three movies?
DYLAN: That’s tough. Great Beauty, for sure. Number one for me. Youth.
ASHLEY: I fucking love Youth.
DYLAN: Close runner up. Same director… That’s my top two.
JESS: What kinds of music are you listening to at home?
ASHLEY: Umm, 90s love music.
DYLAN: CHIN-FM, Italian radio.
ASHLEY: When I’m at Juice, I’m listening to music for 12 hours straight, so when I’m at home, it’s either no music at all or I’m listening to pop or random rock alternative.
JESS: The playlists at Juice during the day, are you creating them yourselves?
DYLAN: SoundCloud. Spotify. It’s a whole mix.
ASHLEY: It’s always changing.
DYLAN: Yeah, we change it up. I’m not saying. Next question.
JESS: Gatekeeping your playlists?
DYLAN: Yeah, it can’t happen.
NOAH: Are you actually concerned that if people knew some of these little things they could emulate what you do?
DYLAN: They already do it. If we did something tomorrow, the next week it would be done a hundred times over.
NOAH: In every issue we speak with restaurants and ask the chef for a recipe. Some might give us the basis but withhold something like a sauce for example but I’ve had other chefs go, “For sure I’ll give you the recipe, I don’t care. People can try to make it at home but it’s never going to be the same.”
DYLAN: If I give you a recipe, I know fucking full out that no one would able to be able to replicate it. But this is not a recipe. I mean, it’s part of a recipe which can get you closer to the final thing, but no one deserves it.
JESS: So you think some things are worth gatekeeping?
DYLAN: I gatekeep everything. Everything. We won’t tell you anything.
NOAH: So what’s next for you? Is Juice an indefinite project as it stands?
ASHLEY: Juice is just our first baby. We just wanted to experiment, see what we could put out there and obviously we’re continuing it until we kill it. Obviously Cafeteria is only for a few years but there’s so much experimental shit that we want to do with it. It’s still a baby. It’s only been alive for a year in April, so we’re still exploring with that. Do we want to stay in the club industry for the rest of our lives? Hell, no.
NOAH: I feel like you guys probably have a ton of ideas in general. Is there other stuff you’re currently working on or stuff you’re thinking of?
ASHLEY: There’s things that we’re thinking of for sure, but not telling you.
DYLAN: Also not telling the rest of Toronto and people with money. Yeah. XXXXXXX. XXXXXXX. All those guys.
ASHLEY: We don’t even know if we’re gonna be living here in the next three years, to be honest.
DYLAN: There’s nothing for us here.
JESS: Pack up the baby.
NOAH: Where’s the first place you’re traveling to with the baby?
ASHLEY: We’re gonna go to Pescara, Dylan’s hometown in Italy. It’s three hours east of Rome on the Adriatic Sea. It’s fucking sexy.
NOAH: I’ve never been to Italy. Always wanted to go.
ASHLEY: Oh, my God, I love it. Italy’s so attractive. I love being Portuguese but Italy…
DYLAN: Yeah, but you get to see a different Italy though.
ASHLEY: And we have our Italian friends there too…
NOAH: Anything else we should ask you guys?
DYLAN: Yeah, how do we do it. The answer is, because we’re fucking amazing.
ASHLEY: It’s fucking crazy. We just do it. Sometimes I wish we had a POV where people could see how much we do in a day because it’s so fucked up.
INTERVIEW: JESSICA SIMMONS + NOAH GANHÃO
PHOTOS: NOUR ABBOUD