Outcrop, a restaurant and arts space from Luca founders Johnny Smith and Daniel Willis, and three of the team from Secret Cinema – Tom Allott, Andrea Moccia and Sabrina Goreeba, will open at 180 The Strand on 7 July.
Outcrop’s restaurant will be run by AngloThai’s John Chantarasak, who has created a menu with a focus on seasonal British vegetables, as well as a smaller selection of native breed animals and line-caught fish, all cooked over charcoal in keeping with the traditional cooking practices of rural Thailand.
Outcrop will source UK-grown ingredients such as ginger, chillies, Thai basil and lemongrass, alongside London honey and native British grains.
Whole-ingredient cooking and preservation techniques will be in line with the sustainable and low waste ethos.
Dishes will include: root vegetable som tam, tamarind and london honey; salt-baked beetroot, scallop roe chilli jam and wild garlic; wye valley asparagus and sunflower seed satay; coconut smoked turbot bone broth and skate wing jungle curry, as well as thai tea burnt cream.
Award-winning bar manager Rob Simpson, of The Clove Club and Gymkhana, has collaborated with Outcrop to curate a drinks list using hedgerow fruits, spirits and botanicals from the best producers across the UK.
Guests will be able to choose from a selection of cocktails made using British ingredients, such as the British Margarita, made from barley eau de vie, London honey and gooseberry, or the Outcrop Martini, which combines London dry gin with a homemade herb garden vermouth, served ice cold.
Outcrop will work with a small collection of UK-based distilleries striving to have a more positive impact: building soil health, eschewing pesticides, growing heritage grains, and using smarter ecological packaging.
Desiree Chantarasak of AngloThai will curate Outcrop’s wine list of low-intervention European wines, all served on tap by the glass or carafe.
Uncharted and Modal Wines will supply their wines to Outcrop in recycled and refillable kegs, completely eliminating the waste caused by glass bottles.
Outcrop will also host an arts and music programme, including a central installation exploring the world beyond our senses.
The musical lineup will be built around an audiophile sound system featuring four vintage Klipschorn speakers, where rising and established DJ talent will create musical journeys throughout the space, inspired by the natural world.
London-based, South African producer, DJ and curator Esa Williams will be collaborating with artist Chisara Agor on an interdisciplinary performance piece exploring both the migration of swallows from South Africa to the UK and the African diaspora.
The project will combine music, movement and visual art to draw upon themes of human history, spirituality and ecology, and will culminate in a live performance featuring classical, folk, electronic, jazz, avant-garde and South & West African traditions.
Outcrop will also work with Sam Willis, one-half of the critically acclaimed Ecstatic Recordings label and of Mojo award-winning band “Walls”, to create a soundtrack and musical collage exploring music’s relationship to nature, playfully integrating organic and synthetic instrumentation from all over the world.
A full music programme will be announced over the coming weeks, and will feature John Gomez (NTS), Joel Martin (Quiet Village), Daniel John Willis & Mr Pedro (NTS).
Initially launching for a three-month limited run at 180 The Strand, in the longer term Outcrop plans to link buildings in cities with large-scale regeneration efforts in the countryside, mobilising communities in cities to increase biodiversity in rural areas.
Outcrop will take walk-ins and reservations for the bar and restaurant, which seats up to 30 guests.