PDT alum Jeff Bell is setting out to make Kees, his new cocktail bar, another staple of the New York dining scene. But rather than recreate an existing hit, he focused the concept on the appeal of tried-and-true classic cocktails. 

“I’m a patient guy,” says Bell, who began at East Village speakeasy Please Don’t Tell as a bartender in 2010 and took over as owner a decade later. “I’ve been at PDT 16 years, and if I’m gonna do something new, I really gotta do it right,” he adds. “And that’s what Kees is all about. I’ve taken everything I’ve learned and refined and homed it, and got it to a point where it’s really nice classic cocktails, a lot of restraint, a lot of elegance.”

Kees is located in the subterranean space at One Cornelia, a corner of the West Village that’s also home to his recently opened agave bar Mixteca and casual taqueria Tacos 1986. Kees is part speakeasy in vibe, but built to skirt any pretense.

While the cocktails at PDT are rooted in “esoteric ingredients,” the idea was to populate the menu at Kees with instantly recognizable drinks. “ I want to be an enabler for a nice time. And sometimes it can become a bit more like a house of worship than a place to enjoy what you’re having in front of you,” he says.

The drink menu is divided into familiar categories — martini, negroni, spritz, highball, collins, sour, old-fashioned  — and each is led by the classic iteration, followed by several riffs on the category. The idea was to manage expectations and remove some of the uncertainty around ordering a drink with an unfamiliar ingredient list.

“ I’m guessing the bestselling drink will be the vodka soda,” he says. The classic drink — typically only two ingredients — has been elevated on the Kees menu with clarified cucumber juice and yuzu, retaining the lightness that a vodka soda drinker expects. “One thing I’m really conscious of is…a vodka soda drinker knows exactly what they like,” he adds.

Bell takes an avid interest in the history of cocktails, taking note of the context for why certain drinks have gone in and out of fashion throughout the decades. With nonalcoholic cocktails on the rise in recent years, Kees is offering a selection of intentional NA cocktails anchored in the flavor profiles of their alcohol-based classic cocktails. 

The name “Kees” is also rooted in history. As a Dutch nickname for Cornelius, Kees is named in tribute to its location on Cornelia Street, and also one of Bell’s ancestors who moved to New York by way of the Netherlands in the 1600s. 

The food menu was designed to quietly accompany the “simplistic, classic nature” of the drinks, with snack-y, shareable options like steak tartare, chips with dip and trout roe, shrimp cocktail and Oysters Rockefeller.

The room was designed in collaboration with design firm Post and Company. “Midcentury Midtown luxurious going out energy — modernize that into a bar downtown,” Bell says of the aesthetic concept. Rounded “Hollywood banquettes” are set underneath dropped ceilings to create a sense of intimacy. The main bar top is green marble, and wood and brass design accents were chosen for their patina.

“I don’t want it to be gaudy. I want it to feel classic; I want it to feel like it could be there for a long time,” adds Bell. “ I wanted it to be of this moment.”