Victoria Park Village Restaurant with Rigid Rules Around Sharing Food Closes

East London restaurant Fayre Share has closed, after opening in May last year. The Victoria Park Village restaurant focused on British homestyle dishes that could be shared, only giving diners the option to order dishes for one, two, or four servings. Co-founder Mark Bloom put the closure down to a lack of weekday demand, according to The Caterer.

The dishes from chef Barry Myers also included roast chicken, arctic roll and Shepherd’s pie; dialling up the British twee factor, gin and tonics were served in teapots, also for sharing. The space had a covered garden with a retractable roof, a prime summer location, and a fireplace for winter days, in a leafy neighbourhood with many food-focused businesses, restaurants and pubs — including renowned butcher the Ginger Pig, specialist wine shop Bottle Apostle, and Michelin Bib Gourmand pub The Empress. Bloom commented:

“Sadly the weekday demand just wasn’t there in the area. The weekends were great and we were lucky enough to get a lot of great reviews and feedback. It was part location, part us suffering from the wider and well reported downturn in restaurant trade.”

Myers and Bloom launched the restaurant nine months ago. Myers was previously managing director of Pure Taste Catering, with Bloom the former restaurant manager at Corbin and King’s esteemed Mayfair restaurant The Wolseley. The concept was based on a nostalgia of childhood, and the pair’s memories of sharing food at meals times. In a time of personalisation, a rise in veganism and so-called ‘flexitarianism,’ such a concept — although pleasant — is self-evidently restrictive for the groups that could dine at Fare Shayre.