Miami's Beloved Mandolin Restaurant Opens a Lifestyle Store

Whether you live in Miami or are visiting, having a meal at the city’s beloved, family-run mediterranean restaurant Mandolin Aegean Bistro is sort of a right of passage. Tucked modestly in Miami’s cool design district, the Mandolin crowd is alive with mirth and cachet and the Turkish- and Greek-inspired food is simple, fresh, unpretentious. The environment, with its rustic mediterranean flair, is equal parts warm and inviting.

For years, Anastasia Koutsioukis, known to her local followers as Mrs. Mandolin has been the restaurant’s host and creative director, and is recognized in the Miami scene as an expert in mediterranean travel. Customers look to her for travel tips for the best Mediterranean markets, from food to fashion. And last month, she opened a café and lifestyle store, an extension of the Mandolin brand that offers people an inside look at her laidback home and lifestyle. She named the store Mrs. Mandolin, naturally.

“The heart and soul of every city around the world is the marketplace,” says Koutsioukis. “In the market, people offer a lot more than just an exchange of product, but rather an exchange of ideas or personal gestures. It is this experience that I want to retell.”