Kwame Onwauchi
Industry
Restaurant
Spotted MP designed and orchestrated the PR launch strategy for acclaimed chef’s much anticipated restaurant Dōgon by Kwame Onwuachi located in Washington D.C., featuring an Afro-Caribbean concept honoring DC Surveyor Benjamin Banneker and his West African Dogon Tribe ancestry. The restaurant celebrates the cultures within D.C.’s four quadrants and serves vibrant cuisine through an Afro-Caribbean lens drawing from Onwuachi’s unique Nigerian, Jamaican, Trinidadian and Creole background. Our agency was also part of the project planning team for the VIP preview launch celebration for the anticipated opening.
Onwuachi is a chef, restaurateur and author. He has penned multiple books, like his successful memoir Notes from a Young Black Chef and the bestselling cookbook My America: Recipes from a Young Black Chef. He has also been a contestant and a judge on Bravo’s Top Chef. In 2019, he was acclaimed by Esquire as its Chef of the Year, recognized by Food & Wine as one of its Best New Chefs, and named by the James Beard Foundation as “Rising Star Chef of the Year.” He now returns to Washington, D.C. four years after closing his highly acclaimed Kith/Kin restaurant in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since then, he has hosted the 2021 and 2022 James Beard Awards in Chicago and opened his restaurant concept Tatiana at the Lincoln Center in New York City in November 2022. Since its opening, Tatiana has garnered numerous accolades, including “The #1 Restaurant in New York City,” by New York Times in 2023 and 2024. The opening of Dōgon was marked as one of the “Top 2024 Most Anticipated Openings in America” by Robb Report and our media efforts have been featured in The Washington Post, Today Show, Forbes, Eater, Axios, The Grio, Essence, Washingtonian Magazine, Northern Virginia Magazine, Fox5, and other regional and national news outlets.
Our agency also led the PR for The Family Reunion, a multi-day culinary festival created by chef Kwame that celebrates diversity in the hospitality industry. The mission of The Family Reunion is to nurture, develop and celebrate racial and ethnic diversity within the next generation of hospitality professionals. Helmed by some of the industry’s most talented chefs, the event firmly established itself as one of the premier culinary events in the country. Our media work for the high profile event has been featured in several media outlets such as Essence, Forbes, NBC, Fox, Rolling Out, Cuisine Noir, and The Washington Post.