Granaio Piccadilly to reopen under control of Criterion Capital

Italian restaurant brand Granaio’s Piccadilly site, the former Criterion restaurant, will reopen in June under the control of Criterion Capital.

According to documents filed with Companies House, Freshmont and New Top, the operating companies for Granaio’s two restaurants, both fell into liquidation. The restaurants both appear to have closed last year when London was placed into Tier 3, forcing all hospitality venues to close.

New Top (Granaio’s Leicester Square restaurant) appointed CMB Partners as liquidators in December, with Freshmont (Granaio’s Piccadilly site) following earlier this month. According to Companies House, Freshmont went into liquidation owing company creditors £2.36m, while New Top owed £1.18m.

A spokesperson for the brand said the Piccadilly restaurant will reopen as Granaio on 2 June for dinner service with lunch service resuming three days later. They said the new company was Trocadero (London) Hotel, for which the only director listed is Marc Sandfort, chief operating officer – hospitality at Criterion Capital. It is unclear whether the Leicester Square site will also reopen.

The Criterion was built in 1874 and was once known as either the Long Bar or Marble Hall. It is part of the 120,000 sq ft Criterion Theatre block, which is owned by the Crown Estate, although the head leaseholder is Criterion Capital. The Grade II-listed venue is famed for its neo-Byzantine golden mosaic ceiling.

The restaurant was owned by Marco Pierre White in the 1990s and is one of the capital's oldest restaurants. In 2009 the restaurant was bought by Irakli Sopromadze of VINS Holdings, however it fell into administration in June 2015. It was reopened in December 2015 as Savini at Criterion by the Gatto family, owner of the Savini restaurant at the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II in Milan.

Savini at Criterion announced its final service on 27 June 2018 and was relaunched under the Granaio brand a month later. A second site in Leicester Square appears to have opened in 2019. Sebastian Gatto was listed as the sole director of both restaurants.

Granaio also has four restaurants in Italy.