NYC’s Ruby Cafe Team Surfs Into Santa Monica With Big Aussie Dreams

New York City restaurant Ruby’s Cafe is coming to Los Angeles next, adding a location in the thick of Santa Monica. The new restaurant will get a slight rebrand and be called Little Ruby, but will carry on the ethos (and much of the menu) from the East Coast operation.

Little Ruby is the brainchild of Nick Mathers, a serial restaurateur behind not only many NYC projects but also Eveleigh and Goldie’s in LA. The aim with the casual cafe is to bring an Australian sensibility to the busy promenade area, with toasts, egg sandwiches, grain bowls, juices, burgers, pasta, and a variety of other options on offer. Think of it as an expanded Bondi Harvest, but with more seating and a longer pedigree (the first Ruby’s opened in 2003 in NYC, after all).

Little Ruby lands along Santa Monica Boulevard, just off the beach in the former Bar Pintxo space. That longtime Spanish stop ended its run in February of this year, and now Mathers and chef Thomas Lim are on-site prepping for an early fall arrival. That’s just about the same timing as soon-to-open Five Leaves in East Hollywood, another Australian (by way of NYC) restaurant coming to LA this year. Add in the likes of Paramount Coffee Project on Fairfax, and suddenly the Australian cafe scene is looking brighter than ever in Los Angeles.

Little Ruby
109 Santa Monica Blvd.
Santa Monica, CA

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