ONE - PURPOSE - What moment first made you feel that hospitality wasn’t just a job, but a calling?

Published 18.08.2025

I think it started long before I ever worked in the industry. I was one of those kids who filled sketchbooks with restaurant ideas—menus, names, floor plans, staff lists (usually featuring waiters I remembered from childhood who were now, obviously, working for me). I was completely hooked on the idea of creating places where people came to feel something.

The stories my family told about great meals out—everything from the food to the feeling of being looked after—became the blueprint for what I wanted to build. Of course, some of my ideas were... ambitious. One sketch featured a full merry-go-round in the centre of the restaurant. Health and safety would’ve had a field day. But that early mix of creativity and cluelessness probably helped shape how I solve problems even now: with a mix of imagination and a (slightly more refined) sense of what actually works.

I’ve always been drawn to films like Ratatouille—full of joy, passion, and belief. And yes, I was equally mesmerised by The Cook, The Thief, His Wife & Her Lover—a wildly theatrical fever dream of food, revenge, and table service. Emotionally they couldn’t be more different, but both capture the idea that restaurants are places where drama unfolds and stories get told. That stuck with me.

To this day, I still think every great restaurant starts with a dream, a rough sketch, and the hope that people want to come in and stay awhile.

That’s always been my PURPOSE—not just to serve food, but to create moments. To build spaces where people feel something real, something memorable, something worth coming back for.

Movie Reference

The Cook, the Thief, His Wife & Her Lover" is a 1989 film directed by Peter Greenaway. It tells the story of a brutal, vulgar gangster named Albert Spica who takes over a French restaurant and terrorizes the staff and customers, particularly his wife, Georgina, and her secret lover, Michael.

Ratatouille" is a 2007 animated film about Remy, a rat with an exceptional sense of smell and taste who dreams of becoming a chef.