Steak restaurant Hawksmoor to open in Manchester

HIGH-end steak restaurant Hawksmoor has chosen Manchester for its first opening outside London.

The independent business, which has five sites in the capital, has signed a lease for a 7,824 sq ft unit across the ground floor and basement at The Courthouse, at 184-186 Deansgate.

The venture will launch in 2015 and ahead of this it is beginning recruitment for the Manchester eatery, with a view to traing some staff in its London sites.

Hawksmoor is the brainchild of childhood friends Will Beckett and Huw Gott who opened their first bar together in 2003.

Mr Beckett said: “We’ve been coming up to Manchester for a few years now, and in that time have really enjoyed the bars and restaurants up here, and we’ve been lucky to meet people like Tim and Jeremy from Living Ventures and Beau from Almost Famous, and they’ve raved about the city.

“We always said that if we were going to go anywhere else it would have to be somewhere where we really enjoyed spending time, and we love Manchester. There’s a really friendly, relaxed atmosphere in the city, and I hope that Manchester in turn will like what we do – really high standards of food, drink and service, but in a relaxed environment with none of the stuffiness that sometimes comes with fine dining.”

Mr Gott added: “We love opening restaurants in heritage buildings, and the Courthouse is a beautiful late Victorian building. I hope we can do something there that does it justice. We always try to adapt what we do to the local area, and we’ll be aiming to do something Manchester can be proud of.”

Hawksmoor sources all its meat from an award winning farm in Yorkshire called The Ginger Pig.