Anthony Demetre and Will Smith to move Arbutus
Anthony Demetre and Will Smith's Soho restaurant Arbutus is set to move to a new location at the end of 2016.
The Frith Street restaurant is expected to open in a new, as yet undisclosed location, in a "new form", although few details are yet available.
However, the pair promised that the new incarnation of Arbutus, which has held a Michelin star since 2007, would "retain the essence of the original" and that further details would be released shortly.
"We have loved every minute of our time in Soho but after 10 years, the time feels right to bring a new lease of life to Arbutus and start its eleventh year in a new home," said Demetre.
"Moving Arbutus to a new location allows us to have an entirely fresh start, with new menus and ideas; we're both looking forward to revealing the next chapter of the Arbutus story," added Smith.
Further details on Arbutus' closing date and future location will be released "shortly".
Demetre and Smith's second restaurant, Wild Honey in Mayfair, will continue to operate as usual.
The move comes just over a year since the pair sold Les Deux Salons restaurant on William IV Street near London's Trafalgar Square to Prescott & Conran.
Late last year, they announced that they would open a new bar named Les Couilles du Chien (French for ‘the dog's bollocks') at Arbutus, which launched in October 2015.
Smith and Demetre opened Arbutus in May 2006 in Soho on the site of the old Bistrot Bruno (owned by Bruno Loubet, where Anthony once worked as Bruno's number two). They followed this up with Wild Honey in 2007, and Les Deux Salons, in September 2010.
The restaurateurs' breed of affordable Michelin-friendly restaurants took the capital by storm when Arbutus opened. Based on a marriage of refined but gutsy French cooking and good value, it was an immediate hit with both the critics and the public, picking up Time Out's Best New Restaurant award in 2006 and the Which? Good Food Guide's London Restaurant of the Year 2007 title, as well as picking up a star in the 2007 Michelin guide.
The pair were awarded the Independent Restaurateurs of the Year Catey in 2008.
Searcys and Anthony Demetre to launch Urban Coterie restaurant >>
Arbutus restaurant team to launch Les Couilles du Chien bar >>
Les Deux Salons sold to Prescott & Conran >>
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