World's best restaurant El Bulli to close
El Bulli, voted the world's best restaurant for the fifth time at last year's S. Pellegrino World's 50 Best awards, is to close for two years chef-owner Ferran Adria has announced.
The restaurant in Roses, Spain, which only opens for six months of the year, will close in 2012 to give Adria and his team the chance to analyse the techniques they have developed at the restaurant over the last 30 years and time to develop new creative processes, Adria said in a speech at the Madrid Fusion Summit on Tuesday.
In a statement, Adria and co-owner Soler said they had decided to commemorate the 50th anniversary of the restaurant's 'conception' with 'the closure of one cycle and the beginning of a new phase.'
Future plans
The restaurant will open from 15 June until 20 December this year. An opening schedule for 2011 will be released in September this year, but it will not re-open in 2012.
During its closure Adria will hand back the three Michelin stars the restaurant currently holds. It will also give more opportunity to other restaurants around the world to take the top spot in the S. Pellegrino World's 50 Best Restaurants list, an accolade El Bulli has held for the past four years and for five years in total.
Although El Bulli opens just six months of the year, Adria works there everyday during that period. At last year's Restaurant Show in London, Adria told BigHospitality it was expected that he would be behind the stove for every sitting.
"People make a big effort to come and expect me to be there. If I'm not there it's not right. If you are not there you also can't develop your creativity," he said.
The chef said the decision to close the restaurant temporarily was partly due to the need to 'lead a more normal life' and spend more time with family.
When the restaurant re-opens in 2014 Adria said in a statement it will be 'constantly challenging the possibilities of the concept of a restaurant and will favour research over production.
