January in London: soul-sapping fog, bone-chilling cold, underpopulated pubs. But the good times will roll soon enough, and the well-heeled (and well-preserved) classes will flock to the streets of Mayfair once more, because, ladies and gentlemen, Jeremy King is back in business, and even those suffering through Dry January will be tempted to raise a glass.
King, a relentless restaurateur, has reigned over London’s social life since 1981, when he and his then partner, Chris Corbin, whom he met while working at Langan’s Brasserie, took over a sleepy little spot called Le Caprice around the corner from the Ritz, at 20 Arlington Street. They populated the walls with David Bailey photographs, and, soon enough, Mick Jagger, Elizabeth Taylor, and Princess Diana were using it as their canteen.
Open for lunch and dinner and serving attractive and innovative crowd-pleasers such as bang bang chicken, crispy-duck salad, golden-tomato-and-basil galette, and salmon fish cakes with wilted spinach and sorrel sauce, it was the happy hunting ground of London’s beau monde for the better part of two decades, when Corbin and King were in charge.
For Corbin and King, Le Caprice was only the beginning. Next came the Ivy, the Delaunay, Colbert, Brasserie Zédel, J. Sheekey, the Wolseley, and even a hotel, the Beaumont. But 41 years later, though Corbin had largely retired, both he and King were left out in the cold after a heavily publicized war with their former financial partners in 2022. Now, however, King’s back at 20 Arlington Street, where it all began.
Mick Jagger, Elizabeth Taylor, and Princess Diana were using it as their canteen.
He’s calling it the Arlington because the name Le Caprice belongs to Richard Caring, who operated the restaurant from 2005 to 2020, when its lease was running out, making it an early victim of the pandemic. (Caring’s restaurant group is still called Caprice Holdings.) For two years, it sat empty while Caring used it as a training facility for employees, some of whom went on to work at Bacchanalia, his Roman-themed hellscape on Berkeley Square. Caring also owns J. Sheekey (meh), Annabel’s (members only!), Sexy Fish (please avoid), the Ivy, and Scott’s (still solid).
When the space came on the market in 2023, King pounced. “Every room, every office, every wine cellar was full of memories,” he says. Many of them involved maître d’hôtel Jesus Adorno, who worked at Le Caprice from its earliest days and stayed on until 2020. “He had lamented the fact that he never got to his 40 years at Le Caprice, and I thought I’d talk to him,” says King. “I started to say, ‘Look, there’s a possibility I can take the Caprice back, nothing certain yet—’ but he said yes before I’d even finished the question.”
King took over the lease in September and returned to the restaurant for the first time since he sold it in 2000. “Going back down was poignant, exciting, and emotional, but also rather sad, because in many ways the restaurant had borne the scars of an extra 20 years of life and use,” he says. “On the face of it, it looked as though it would be fairly straightforward to renovate it back to what it was. Actually, the more we looked, the more we realized it needed help.”
Bringing back the mirror behind the 12-seat bar was the first order of business. “The old Caprice only worked if the bar was full, and I don’t mean just financially, but atmospherically,” says King. “What’s crucial is that the mirror allows [guests] to feel engaged without actually looking into the room.”
Next up: hanging the black-and-white David Bailey photographs—some familiar, some new. (Lord Snowdon always preferred the table underneath the image of himself as a young man in the 60s, staring down the camera and dragging on a cigarette.)
The menu will not stray too far from its greatest hits, but in this area King looks to Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s The Leopard: “Everything must change so that everything can remain the same.” (Don’t worry. The bang bang chicken remains unadulterated.)
Expect a few weeks of friends-and-family service, starting in late February. When everything is seamless, King will welcome the public, and reservations will be taken on the online platform SevenRooms. “It’s impossible to do an opening night because even if I invite 200 people standing up, 2,000 people will be justifiably upset that they aren’t included,” he says.
King has learned a lot since his first time at Le Caprice, back in 1981, but, he says, “I still have the same passion, the same desire, and the same energy. But I’m a lot wiser, a lot calmer, and much better at delegating to other people. In those days, I used to think that Chris and I had to do everything ourselves. Now I’m fortunate to be surrounded by an extraordinary group.”
And they’ve got a lot of work to do. In addition to the Arlington, King will open the Park, a Wolseley-like all-day café in Bayswater, and a revamp of Simpson’s, the white-tablecloth institution in the Strand, before the end of 2024. Yes, that’s three restaurants in a year.
As for Le Caprice, it’s rumored Caring is reviving it in the much-hyped Chancery Rosewood, which was designed by architect Sir David Chipperfield and is set to open in the former U.S. Embassy building in Grosvenor Square, not too far from its old digs. (A P.R. representative for the Rosewood said they could not offer “further details with regards to Le Caprice.”) ReardonSmith, as hotel specialist architects, is working furiously so that it can open at some point in 2025. (Caring did not return a request for comment.)
But King isn’t worried. “One thing I want to avoid is napkin wars,” he says. “There’s plenty of room for [both of] us. Richard Caring has done a particularly good job with the demographic he appeals to, and I embrace and encourage a different demographic.”
Kate Moss, Harry Styles, all crowned heads of Europe—probably best to get your assistants on those February bookings. The Arlington has only 75 covers, after all.
Ashley Baker is a Deputy Editor at AIR MAIL and a co-host of the Morning Meeting podcast