Magazine Serves Dining Venture

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Magazine Serves  Dining Venture
Journalists Turn Page: Heather Sperling

Most new restaurants hope to get press to attract customers.

A new Silver Lake restaurant hasn’t even opened and it already has its own online magazine and following.

That’s because its co-founders, Heather Sperling and Emily Fiffer, are two former food editors who decided to draw on that journalism experience when they moved to Los Angeles to open their first restaurant, Botanica.

Sperling, 33, was an editor at New York-based industry publication Tasting Table, and Fiffer, 34, was an editor at DailyCandy. The pair decided to open a restaurant after organizing a series of design and food pop-up markets in Chicago. They chose Los Angeles because they felt they could be a more integral part of a neighborhood here than in another city.

“It’s a natural evolution of our careers and lives,” said Sperling. “We found ourselves wanting to do something larger in scope than we could as editors.”

At the same time, the business partners wanted to include something they knew how to do, which is why they launched the magazine last year.

BotanicaMag.com features professional photos and recipes for items including chocolate cashew date milk. It also eventually will sell Botanica-branded food products, including granola and spices, after the 58-seat restaurant and an adjacent market open on Silver Lake Boulevard in April. The restaurant will be vegetable centered, but not vegetarian or vegan, and will serve cocktails.

The partners raised about 95 percent of the project’s funds from individual investors and launched a $60,000 Kickstarter campaign in late November, they said.

The purpose was as much about raising money as raising awareness, said Sperling.

“We loved the idea of getting the community invested before we even opened,” said Sperling. “Crowdfunding is a fantastic way to do that.”

– Caroline Anderson

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