Corbin & King looking to resurrect Bellanger
In an email message, CEO Jeremy King said the group was considering relaunching the restaurant with a more casual offering inspired by the group's beloved Parisian-style Brasserie Zédel in Piccadilly.
It comes after plans to sell the Bellanger site, which overlooks the Islington Green, apparently fell through as a result of the Coronavirus pandemic.
Having originally opened Bellanger in 2015, Corbin & King closed it in August last year saying, at the time, that the group 'just couldn’t make it the success we aspired to'.
King now says the intention would be to reopen the restaurant's doors next month initially as a pop up, with a view to making it more permanent operation should the revamp prove successful.
"It is almost exactly a year since we announced the closure of Bellanger and I can still acutely remember being inundated with messages of disappointment and pleas to reconsider," says King.
"It did make us hesitate, but the truth of the matter was that we felt we hadn’t quite got it right in fulfilling the needs of Islington – the reality of over three years of insufficient levels of business meant that we couldn’t financially sustain it any longer.
"But times have changed and we have always been rather wistful about just how much we enjoyed our position on the Green and all the loyal customers.
"So we set to wondering about trying again, and having had the agreed sale of the site scuppered by the pandemic, and with so many more of you working from home, we asked ourselves, should we reopen as a pop up initially and if it proves popular then continue next year?
"Thoughts were along the lines of a new all day menu, inspired by Brasserie Zédel; a change of appearance to make it more casual; and just a sense of being somewhat more accessible."
As well as Zédel, Corbin & King's portfolio includes such iconic London restaurants as The Wolseley, Soutine, and The Delaunay.
It was reported last month that Manzi's, the group's planned pescatarian restaurant in Soho, will hopefully open in October, having had its original plan to launch at the end of May scuppered by the pandemic.
