Why are celebrity chefs falling prey to a scourge of squatters? Blame landlords
Evening Standard|April 18, 2024
STAFFING woes. No-shows.Giles Coren.
David Ellis
Why are celebrity chefs falling prey to a scourge of squatters? Blame landlords

Thought restaurants had it hard already? You ain't seen nothin' yet. Chefs' newest nemesis are squatters.

From the middle of last week, Gordon Ramsay's Camden pub, the York & Albany, was occupied by a group of them, who took to Instagram with plans to open a community café "for victims of gentrification". A soup kitchen may have been in the works. Ramsay put paid to all that on Tuesday, obtaining a claim for possession from the courts.

With that drama deflated, a few hours later, Marco Pierre White's deservedly short-lived Leicester Square restaurant Mr White's (shut since February) had similar treatment. Padlocks were slung on the doors and a sign went up wittering about occupier's rights, neither of which stopped the police securing the building yesterday afternoon. But you get the idea if your heyday was the Nineties and you own a restaurant, these are harrowing times. Has anyone checked on Antony Worrall Thompson?

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