Osip 2.0 – Somerset’s new restaurant for all seasons
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“I always had this dream of having a restaurant in the countryside,” says Merlin Labron-Johnson, the 33-year-old Devon-born chef behind farm-to-table establishments The Old Pharmacy and Osip in Somerset. After four years, Osip has outgrown its intimate 22-cover ground-floor home at the hotel Number One Bruton and will reopen in a standalone venue this month.
The restaurant has garnered a reputation for its daily-evolving menus spotlighting locally grown, seasonal ingredients and signature pithivier dish – dubbed “pie of wonder” by restaurant critic Marina O’Loughlin. Osip regulars include photojournalist Don McCullin, actress Haley Bennett and, when she is able to step away from her own kitchen at Heckfield Place, culinary director Skye Gyngell.
The restaurant’s new home, an 18th-century building, is located close to the original, in an idyllic spot at the edge of a pine forest near North Brewham. The building was previously owned by the team at Hauser & Wirth, which is omnipresent in the area. “It wasn’t listed, by some miracle,” says Labron-Johnson of securing the property, which required extensive renovations, partially funded via Kickstarter. Bruton-based architecture studio Bindloss Dawes was commissioned, along with designers Ruby Kean and Lisa Hyatt-Jones of Atelier LK, to create a modern setting while maintaining the historical integrity of the existing structure. Most of the original team will relocate to the new site, which is planning a soft launch in early August – bookings are open from 20 August.
Labron-Johnson is no stranger to new beginnings, having opened five restaurants, including Portland in London’s Fitzrovia, which was awarded a Michelin star when he was just 24. He says the goal at the new Osip is to create a remote “destination” with land, bedrooms and space to encompass a more “cohesive, holistic hospitality experience”. A residency programme for chefs and artists is set to follow next year.
“We wanted it to feel like someone’s home,” say the designers of the new Osip, who have curated a lounge and open central kitchen, with features made by local artisans, including a hand-carved bar and countertop by Somerset-based woodworker Max Bainbridge of Forest + Found and lighting from artist couple Andrew Pierce Scott and Natalia Triantafylli. From next month, there will be four large, luxurious bedrooms at the restaurant, each with its own palette, high ceilings and decorative charm.
“Cooking is my passion but design and this whole process have been really inspiring,” says Labron-Johnson of his journey from chef to restaurateur and, now, quasi-hotelier. “When you’re a chef, you care mostly about the food, how it tastes, how it looks; being a restaurateur, in the same way, you start to care about every little detail – from the guests’ journey, to when they go online and look at the website, to how the door handle feels when they enter the space and, of course, the welcome.” He’s still mulling over what will define the new Osip’s, but the entrance curtains courtesy of leather designer Bill Amberg offer an immediate sense of ceremony.
And what of the opening menu? Labron-Johnson says it is still in development but guests can expect vibrant herby broths, crudités of farm vegetables, beetroot tacos (another Osip speciality), and the return of his infamous cheese course starring homemade fruit bread and slivers of truffle. “Simple, pared-back, focusing on the quality of the details,” he says. “That’s what we’re all about.”
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