Jason Atherton has embarked on a dizzying reorganisation of his London restaurants that will see the closure of three ventures and the opening of at least five (depending on how you count them).
The latest opening to be announced is Mary’s, a grill-led restaurant that will take over the Mayfair premises of Pollen Street Social – where Jason launched his entrepreneurial career after quitting Gordon Ramsay 15 years ago. Pollen Street Social will close on July 31, as will the more casual Social Eating House in Soho.
Mary’s will consist of a main restaurant, with the Blind Pig cocktail bar from Soho transferring to take over the former bar at PSS. Meanwhile, the old chef’s counter will serve smash burgers to walk-ins. Mary’s will open on August 16, barely two weeks after PSS closes – but in an added twist, the whole operation is scheduled to close down completely from January to April next year for a major refurb that will see the burger bar moving downstairs into a new ‘speakeasy-style’ basement.
The third closure is Harrods Social, which opened three years ago and will be replaced by a second branch of the department store’s in-house Harrods Cafe. Jason will maintain his presence at Harrods with the opening next month of Hot Dogs by Three Darlings, a 25-seater ‘gourmet’ hot dog stand also serving fries, sundaes and booze.
Three Darlings, meanwhile, is a new sub-brand offering English dishes, which will be launched by Jason and his wife Irha (and named after their three daughters) in Pavilion Street, Chelsea next month.
Also opening this summer is Sael, which has taken over the former site of Aquavit in St James’s Market behind Piccadilly Circus, where ex-PSS head chef Dale Bainbridge will present what is said to be a brasserie menu using all-British ingredients.
In November, the long-trailed Row on 5 opens on two floors of a Savile Row newbuild, with former The Ritz chef Spencer Metzger running the kitchen.
Row on 5 may well be the most gastronomically ambitious of the openings, although when he announced the closure of Pollen Street Social in March, Jason made clear that he thought the days of “fine dining” were numbered and that his new moves were in response to the demands of the market place.
Given the staggered release of news about the changes over the past months, we can expect more bombshells from Jason in the weeks ahead. He certainly seems to be putting less emphasis on the “Social” branding that was a key component of his early success, although his overall business still describes itself as “a Social company”, he still has the Little Social and City Social in London, and five of his eight restaurants around the world have “Social” in their name.
