THE meeting between the new owners of the Wolseley, Minor International, and their staff last week was marred by an unfortunate comment about plans to open a branch in Russia.
Author Susan Hill, who wrote The Woman In Black, says that Jeremy King, pictured, appeared to have been “escorted” from the restaurant he helped found. Hill continued in the Spectator: “The employees were summoned to a meeting with their new masters, to be told that they would become part of a global brand, with little Wolseleys cloned all over the world.
“A chef asked when this would begin. ‘Very soon.’ ‘Where first?’ ‘Russia.’ The silence that followed takes little imagining.” The Londoner understands this location was suggested by accident.
A spokesperson for Minor said this morning: “We stress clearly that Minor has no plans to open in Russia.”
Soho rodents turn noses up at vegan
Vegan restaurant Gauthier, founded by French chef Alexis Gauthier, is no longer the subject of visits from Soho’s omnipresent vermin since changing its menu to a plant-based one in 2020. “Funnily enough we don’t have the same problems other Soho restaurants have with mice and rats since we turned the restaurant vegan,” marketing boss James Lewis told us. “Maybe they don’t like vegan food: we used to have a problem just like everywhere else in Soho but now they’ve just gone”. Wake up rodents, it’s 2022.
Branagh plucks up ghastly image
Sir KENNETH BRANAGH has a real way with words. As the Oscar-winning writer and director of Belfast, left, gave a rallying cry to the film industry at a recent conference in the Picturehouse Central he turned to journalists. He gave thanks, Screen Daily reported, to “the critics who have on occasion, metaphorically, plucked the hair from my testicles; but have also regularly given me small doses of moisturiser to cope with the damage”. That’s an image we won’t be able to get out of our heads for a long time.
ISABEL’S in Mayfair hosted last night’s launch of Artingstall’s Gin, created by American Bridesmaids director Paul Feig, who partied with Stephen Fry and Camden Cox. Bridgerton’s Phoebe Dynevor was at the Almeida’s press night of Daddy with designer Giles Deacon and partner Gwendoline Christie. Meanwhile Jade Jagger and Shingai Shoniwa were at a Mayfair bash.
SW1A
CARRIE JOHNSON, below, was once cruelly dubbed “Princess Nut Nut” by Dominic Cummings, but eco activist Ben Goldsmith tells us he’s got it wrong. “She’s very calm. I’ve never seen her be rude.”
RISHI SUNAK’s wife Akshata Murthy has hit the headlines for her non-dom status, but not everyone thinks she’s fair game. One Tory MP the Londoner spoke to this morning confessed: “I don’t like the targeting of wives very much.” Such qualms may fall on deaf ears, one suspects.
