The restaurateur Soren Jessen has had some nights. There was the one at Elton’s white tie and tiara ball, or the dinner date with Simon Cowell “where he just openly hit on my girlfriend,” Jessen remembers, eyebrows up. He’s raised a little hell with the Danish royals, and found his face in Tatler a few times. How does he do it? He smiles and shrugs, palms up. Having a city institution helps.
That institution is One Lombard Street, which on Friday celebrated its 25th birthday. Its opening marked the moment Jessen, a former hedge fund man, went it alone. “I walked in and thought: how can this place be empty?” he says of the grand, Grade II-listed building. “Next door you’ve got the Bank of England, the Royal Exchange, and the Lord Mayor’s Mansion House.” It sounds an easy decision. “I said yes straight away,” he nods. “And then I spoke to the architects, the planners, the licensing boards and they all said, ‘well, you know this is impossible…’”
Refurbishment was painful — and included cutting a £150,000 range in half to fit the kitchen (”It felt like buying a Ferrari and chopping it up to get it in the garage”) — but the restaurant proved a hit, even after an inauspicious start. On launch night, the room packed with press, the kitchen’s ventilation packed up and there was no hot food. The first two weeks were marred by a still-pending drinks licence. “But everyone wanted wine, so had to give it to them compliments of the house,” says Jessen. “Of course, we didn’t tell them it was free till they already had the bill…”
Success came quickly, and the restaurant picked up the Square Mile’s first star within two years (holding it for eight). But Jessen says now it is “simple food, good service, good wine, the best location” that keeps it ticking, with a bistro-style menu in a faintly palatial room. “It’s not unusual to have people in here at 11 o’clock with a martini. And we have still have guests who come in twice a day.” In fact, he says, 2023 is set to be their busiest year.
The crowd remains a mix, he says — big names who make money go round. “It might be Jacob Rothschild lunching with Mike Bloomberg. We’ve had several of the governors of the Bank of England, politicians like shadow chancellor Rachel Reeves, who was a hit with staff thanks to her handwritten thank-you note.” And still the starry types. Even the artwork has names attached — much of it belongs to Mark Hix, the chef, and there’s an Antony Gormley above the bar.
But it’s the parties Jessen recalls with the biggest grin. “For her birthday, Simon Le Bon asked us to swap all the art for pictures of [supermodel wife] Yasmin. That was incredible,” he says. “We’ve had Bryan Ferry, every European royalty… at Nicky Haslam’s do, there was Mick Jagger and Michael Heseltine in the same room! I was between Kate Moss and Marianne Faithfull, sat there like I was watching the tennis.”
There have been marriages here, mariachi bands, De Beers showing diamonds. So what next? Is he already planning the next party? Jessen shrugs again. “Well, it’s not long ‘til I’ve been in restaurants 30 years, so that seems something…” He sips his martini, eyes flashing. You imagine the invites are already in the post.
