After seven years at the forefront of London’s Bermondsey Street dining scene, Village East has undergone a major overhaul to reflect changing tastes and keep the venue bang up to date. Not one to let the grass grow under his feet, co-founder Adam White (late of The Riding House Café) led the redesign with the team from London studio Box 9, and together they were looking for “more intimacy and mood” at the restaurant.
Paradoxically, that involved opening up many of the existing spaces. Village East is spread over two connecting but very different adjoining properties (a modern apartment block and a listed cloth factory) and White wanted to connect the labyrinthine series of eating and drinking spaces into a more coherent whole. Two new bars have been added to reflect the current enthusiasm for innovative cocktail culture, and on the furniture front, UK antique dealers such as Pritchard Antiques, Lassco and Elemental have been called on to source items to take their place alongside bespoke features (see the welded wall of French safety deposit boxes).
