The special relationship between the US and UK may be faltering in some areas – but it’s going strong when it comes to cross-Atlantic drinking and dining. Claridge’s has just announced Dante – the Manhattan bar and restaurant that’s been in residence at the Mayfair hotel since June last year – is going permanent this summer. Dante’s residency was originally slated to run until the end of July 2025, then extended until the end of 2025 and again into 2026.
Dante Mayfair will take over the former Claridge’s Restaurant space from the middle of June, with its signature Italian cocktails, live music, all-day dining and “fluffy” orange juice Garibaldis.
“We are so proud to call Claridge’s, and London, our new home,” Linden Pride, Dante’s co-owner, said in a statement. “At Dante Mayfair, we will amp up the volume on our New York roots across design, menu and music, aiming to bring an impish sense of fun to Davies Street. That sense of a neighbourhood that Dante’s created for decades in New York? Mayfair’s about to feel it.”
Pride and his business partner and wife Nathalie Hudson took over Dante in 2015, 100 years after it opened as Caffe Dante in Manhattan’s Greenwich Village. It was long a hub for the neighbourhood’s Italian community to meet over espresso and biscotti, and was later frequented by the likes of Al Pacino, Patti Smith and Bob Dylan. Since taking over Dante, Australians Pride and Hudson have built on its legacy and it’s become a destination for cocktails and Italian- and Australian-inspired all-day dining; in 2019 it was named the best bar in the world by World’s 50 Best Bars. A Dante spin-off opened in New York’s West Village in 2020.
Claridge’s has lately been establishing itself as a destination for diners – particularly with the launch earlier this year of a bakery led by top baker Richard Hart. Dante continues that trend. “The goal is to make this restaurant the living room of Mayfair, a relaxed spot with great food, wonderful people and, of course, a buzzing atmosphere thanks to Dante’s signature Martini hour and soulful live music,” Claridge’s managing director Thomas Kochs said in a statement.
Dante Mayfair opens in mid-June.
