Closed since 2016 after a 150-year run, this Soho icon, founded by Napoleon III’s chef Auguste Kettner, reopened its doors in 2018 as Kettner's Townhouse following a wholesale refurbishment by new owners Soho House, who have now made the restaurant and piano bar members only. The ravishing art deco Champagne Bar, thankfully, remains open to anyone who looks the part, its marble-topped, walnut-clad horseshoe counter still one of the best places in Soho to while away the time when you've nowhere more pressing to be.
Many of the immaculate cocktails are based on fine fizz from a stellar cellar – a Ruinart Sparkling Sazerac, perhaps – while the likes of New Quarter, a Vieux Carré /Hanky Panky hybrid, are compelling new creations. Kings, cads and high society fops once canoodled with their floozies here in the cabinets particuliers upstairs – now the hotel bedrooms are a convenient bolthole to spend the night if the excitement of drinking in this legendary address goes to your head.