Annie Shi, a co-owner of the West Village’s French-Italian restaurant King and its uptown Rockefeller Center sibling Jupiter, is opening a spot of her own.

She signed a lease at 15-17 Doyers Street, the short-lived home for Doyers Oldtown, a fast-casual Malaysian restaurant that first opened at the address a couple of years ago. Shi says she plans to open a wine bar serving Chinese food, where she has applied for a liquor license. The project is aiming to open this summer, but she hasn’t chosen a name yet.

A partner and beverage director, for King and Jupiter, Shi will remain with the hospitality group. However, the forthcoming wine bar is her solo endeavor — much like her collaborator Clare de Boer has done, breaking off to open Stissing House upstate in Pine Plains, New York.

Upon opening, Shi’s wine bar will join restaurants like Chinese Tuxedo and Nom Wah in defining the historic Doyers Street in 2025 — alongside a growing number of spots spotlighting natural wine alongside Chinese food like Phoenix Palace and Tolo, both nearby in Lower Manhattan.

With Shi’s new wine bar, a menu serving Chinese food is personal for the New York native who grew up in Rego Park, Queens. Her parents immigrated to the city in the ’80s. “My dad is from Shanghai and my mom is further north, from Dalian,” she told Cherry Bombe in an interview. She added: “I was definitely, categorically, not allowed to work in restaurants. It didn’t even cross my mind because my parents were so focused on getting me out of that world. My dad worked in a Chinese takeout shop when he first moved here. He is one of the best and fastest dumpling folders I know.”

Shi has been a part of King since it first opened in 2016, overseeing all things front of house, alongside de Boer and Jess Shadbolt, chefs who had arrived in Manhattan by way of London’s esteemed River Cafe. The duo met Shi when she was working in finance in London. “A self-taught sommelier with precise, far-ranging taste, she builds the wine lists,” the New York Times wrote of her in a 2018 profile.

From its launch, she had a knack for orchestrating the fine details to make simplicity streamlined. “The more we can draw everything closer together to the edge, the more space we can create here,” she said of her table-setting philosophy in the Times interview. She has often spoken about being a mother working in restaurants.

In 2022, the team expanded with Jupiter, a pasta-forward restaurant in Rockefeller Center.