High profile chef Michael Riemenschneider is relocating Canvas to the former site of Le Cirque, in Chelsea, to open on 19 August that will include a chefs table, experimental cocktail bar, wine cellar and cheese room.
“We were looking for a second site to open a brasserie but when I got offered this site it wasn’t right for a brasserie but would love to open Canvas here. We were fully booked for six months in advance so decided to look for bigger site anyway,” Riemenschneider told M&C Report.
“I had planned to look for another site in a year to 18 months but this became available it was a dream. I decided we could not do a brasserie here but I would love to bring Canvas to the site.”
The site will have 60-covers and a bar for 20 people – an increase from its 20-seater original site that opened in November last year.
Above the restaurant are 45 serviced apartments that will be able to use the restaurant for lunch and dinner as well as optional room service.
“I hoped, but did not think we would be that successful to be booked up six months in advance.” The original canvas site is closed at present to concentrate on the new restaurant and the Black Boys pub.
“The brasserie is still on the cards. I would like to have a place to go where I all the things on the menu are things I love to eat as well as being things I love to cook.” Riemenschneider said the concept would be “home cooking but done really nicely”.
Riemenschneider recently bought the Black Boys Inn at Henley-on-Thames, a 16th Century Inn with a 40-cover restaurant and eight en-suite guest rooms, he said: “I’ve been in love with this place for the last five years and trying to buy it.”
He said he is considering adding spa facilities to the pub to allow guests to enjoy a massage or treatment after their lunch.
“I would never say never to opening another pub. We have a lot of good people in our company now who are young and aspiring and want to achieve things.”
