‘Gastrodrome’ pioneer Joel Kissin to open new bistro after 11 years away

The pioneering restaurateur who helped launch the revolutionary “Gastrodrome” dining halls of the Nineties is making a return to London after an 11-year “exile” in New York.

Joel Kissin, who was a partner of design and restaurant “Godfather” Sir  Terence Conran throughout the decade, will open a French bistro called Boulestin in St James’s Street in September.

The pair are credited with transforming the West End’s then mediocre restaurant scene with a succession of blockbuster openings such as Pont de la Tour at Butler’s Wharf near Tower Bridge, Mezzo in Soho, Bluebird in Chelsea and Quaglino’s in St James’s.

The restaurant is named after the influential French food writer and “culinary ambassador to the English” Xavier Marcel Boulestin who was Britain’s first TV celebrity chef and who had ran his own eponymous restaurant in Covent Garden.

In contrast to the vast Gastrodrome dining rooms — Mezzo could accommodate 700 diners and was the largest restaurant in Europe — Boulestin will offer a relatively modest 60 seats.

Mr Kissin, 58, said: “I am trying to do something quite different. What I did was quite a long time ago. I don’t really want to do a very large restaurant again because it is harder for the food to be as good as one would like.”

He added: “Boulestin was a restaurant with so much history. I’m not trying to copy the original. But its history presents a rich tapestry that has influenced me in terms of the design and the food.”

Customers would expect to pay about £55 a head for dinner and there will be “all-in” set lunch at around £30, he said. The new restaurant is at the site of the former L’Oranger and there will also be a smaller 30-seat café called Café Marcel.

Mr Kissin fell out with Sir Terence —although they have reconciled — following an ill-fated venture in New York that foundered after 9/11. Mr Kissin spent the rest of the “Noughties” developing property in New York before deciding to return to London.

London restaurant experts said Mr Kissin had played a major but little recognised role in realising Sir Terence’s vision, which triggered the transformation of London’s once dire reputation as an eating out destination.

Boulestin gave the first cooking demonstration on TV in 1937. His landmark restaurant opened in 1926 and survived until 1994.