After shutting down for 15 months just on the total refurbishment, the restaurant opened its doors in October 2014. Rhodes exclaims that he is “absolutely delighted with all of those changes”.
Describing the extent of the refurbishment, he says he wanted to “hold on to that British edge” while making a bold statement. And he has done so, with the interiors being the first to showcase the extent to which the restaurant has moved on. The entrance features gold and white butterfly-adorned doors, with a bar and terrace inspired by a traditional English conservatory.
Faux grass-adorned walls and a honeycomb-inspired reception lead into the main restaurant, reminiscent of an English garden setting. Casual yet sophisticated, the base palette of white is complemented by dashes of yellow and green. Light wooden tables, creamy white chairs, and butterfly-inspired chandeliers complete the look.
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The menu is equally refreshing, with British favourites including Welsh rarebit with a fresh tomato and chive salad, braised oxtails with creamy mashed potatoes, and warm eccles cakes with homemade stilton ice cream.
The terrace is now open as the bar, having stayed shut during the Rhodes Mezzanine era. Rhodes adds: “It’s the only restaurant in the Grosvenor House Tower One that has beer on tap. So you can go in there and get a Guinness or lager on tap, and that’s attracted some people just coming in, sitting in the bar and having a drink. That’s what I wanted. I wanted to become more of a bar with restaurant, whereas Mezzanine was more restaurant with bar.”
While Rhodes still loves going to fine dining restaurants — he mentions Le Gavroche by Michel Roux Jr as one of his favourites — he says the casual twist was definitely needed for Rhodes W1.
He muses: “We are in the entertainment business, we’re all here to entertain. And certainly you’ve got to have some of the best actors in the world who are in that restaurant to keep drawing everybody back. People go and see The Mousetrap in London; it’s still running after 60 years, but people go back time and time again. So each performance has to almost outdo the other, it has to be that good. I look upon us as being a theatre, that’s exactly what we are.”
It’s not always been smooth sailing in the region. His restaurant Rhodes 44 at St. Regis Abu Dhabi closed at the end of August 2014. While the venue was successful according to the chef, the hotel owners took a call to rebrand the restaurant to an all-day dining venue.
They asked him to stay on, but Rhodes says: “Because it was the main restaurant of the hotel they wanted it to be a 24-hour operation, and with that they would have preferred to have the style of food that we were creating — but in a buffet style. Buffet style is just not me.”
Rhodes reiterates he left on “really good terms” with the hotel. “I just chatted with them and said, ‘this is just not me’, but I can understand why that hotel needed a restaurant that was open from early hours till late at night.”
He adds that Abu Dhabi, while a different market from Dubai, has potential. “It’s going to do nothing but grow there and I would love to go back [to Abu Dhabi].”
In addition to his restaurants, Rhodes is heavily involved in CSR activities. He is working on a programme to promote healthy eating among school children, launched with Foremarke School in Dubai, in 2014, where he works with catering companies to provide healthy school meals. It all came about in conversation with a friend whose children attend the school.
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