It’s surprising, and altogether endearing, that Neil Henderson still experiences bouts of imposter syndrome after the long and fruitful career he’s had in the restaurant industry.
The director and partner at Whistler’s Wild Blue Restaurant + Bar was one of this year’s inductees to the BC Restaurant Hall of Fame, and despite a long list of accomplishments gathered over a more than 30-year career, Henderson seems constitutionally incapable of accepting his flowers.
“It’s probably a combination of a Scottish upbringing and conservative parents who taught you to never blow your own horn,” he said, tucked into a teal velvet booth in Wild Blue’s dining room.
Despite his aversion to accolades, you can’t say Henderson isn’t deserving of them. From humble beginnings as a busser to opening what has become one of Whistler’s top fine dining destinations in two short years, his career has a certain poetic symmetry to it. In 1992, he landed a job at the casual family restaurant Jimmy D’s, funnily enough, located where Wild Blue is today.
“[Working there] was a realization that the restaurant industry in North America was very different from the UK. Very service focused, generally more engaged and engaging,” he said. “It was a really fun place to be.”
Some of the relationships Henderson formed during that time have stayed with him until this day and cemented his love for a community that never wavered. In fact, it was best friend Kevin Wood, now co-owner of Alpine Café, who scored him a second job that first summer as a busser at Araxi, the start of a decades-long relationship with the restaurant, as well as founding owner and fellow BC Restaurant Hall-of-Famer Jack Evrensel.
After spending the fall back in Scotland, Henderson returned to Whistler with his sights set on a server position at Araxi. Although the famously demanding Evrensel had his doubts, he took a chance on the 21-year-old, a decision that would pay dividends over the years.
“Jack taught me to have high expectations of those around you, with a firm belief it would be insulting to them if you didn’t. He taught me to walk the talk. Lead by example, try to work harder than anybody else and maintain that mindset of being fair, consistent, and humble,” Henderson said. “If there was ever any point I thought I was working hard, Jack was working harder. There was never any occasion that I outworked or outpaced him.”
Henderson continued as a full-time server until he was offered the daytime manager position at Araxi in ’96, his first foray into leadership. By ’98, he was promoted to GM.
“I had no idea what I was doing. I was totally out of my depth, but Jack seemed to trust me,” Henderson said.
Araxi continued to push the envelope, raising its standards, and capturing the attention of the Vancouver market. By 2003, however, Henderson was looking for a chance to progress, and took an offer to head to the city to become projects director for Evrensel’s Toptable Group. That afforded him the opportunity to not only work in and run all four of Toptable’s restaurants (they now count 12), but amass an array of varied experience.
“It was a very diverse role, everything from researching real estate for future sites to implementing best practices to IT to reservation systems,” he said.
It also meant Henderson was well armed with the knowledge and ability to open new restaurants. After a stint managing the 2010 Olympics contracting for all of Toptable’s restaurants, he returned to Whistler full-time as Araxi’s restaurant director.
“I definitely felt revitalized and entered into Araxi with a new energy,” he said.
That new energy channeled into new openings when, following Evrensel’s 2014 sale of Toptable to the Aquilini Investment Group, Henderson was instrumental, alongside Hall-of-Fame Executive Chef James Walt, in developing and implementing the design and concept at Bar Oso and The Cellar, both next door to Araxi, as well as the 2017 renovation of Il Caminetto, where he also hired and trained the management.
What eventually took Henderson away from Toptable was a chance to reunite with his mentor, Evrensel, to open Wild Blue, and join partners, Vancouver Chef of the Year Alex Chen (who was also inducted into the BC Restaurant Hall of Fame this year), and investor and Dallas Stars owner Tom Gaglardi.
“I realized, with the support of my wife Lynn, that this was my passion and my career and it was what I seemed to be best at. But I was also very engaged with the opportunity of sitting on the coattails of Jack and Alex and Tom and going along for the ride,” Henderson said. “There’s always risks with a restaurant and always something that could go wrong … but I felt the bases were loaded with this team.”
He also credited the rest of the team around him at Wild Blue for making it the wild success it has been,
“It’s the most incredibly group of fundamentally kind individuals that love looking after people, love caring for people. I’ve really never met a group quite like it,” Henderson said. “The knowledge is very high, their engagement is really high. They have high expectations of one another as well.”
Unsurprisingly, the 52-year-old isn’t quite ready to rest on his laurels. There is always more to achieve, more room to grow.
“I’m going to just keep on improving myself, my own learning and leadership style,” said Henderson. “I still have so much to learn and so many ways I can improve as well. I’m constantly being fed lessons.”
Looking back, it’s hard for Henderson to wrap his head around the trajectory his career and life in Whistler have taken.
“I look back at ’92, I was a 20-year-old ski bum. Did I ever see myself owning and operating the same place where I had my very first job in Whistler? No. To have that full circle, it’s interesting, to say the least,” he said.
“What I truly realized with the opening of the restaurant is that one of my true passions is looking after people, and I get to do that on an almost daily basis.”
