The success of Thomas Cubitt SW1 – the trendy gastropub whose success confirms the re-awakening of that ‘sleeping beauty’ Belgravia – seems to be breeding imitators.

Latest is the Pantechnicon Rooms, a bar-cum-restaurant scheduled to open next month. It’s apparently part of a foodie master plan Grosvenor Estate has hatched to transform Motcomb Street (rather as the Howard de Walden estate transformed Marylebone High Street). The street already had the capital’s smartest Waitrose, and recent arrivals include leading chocolatier Rococo and top deli Ottolenghi.

In the steps of Thos. Cubitt (Belgravia’s master builder, 1788-1855) and impending Sloane Square arrival The Botanist (a reference to Sir Hans Sloane, 1660-1753), the name of the new establishment harks back to the area’s Georgian roots.

At the beginning of the 19th century, the Pantechnicon was a bazaar, later a furniture warehouse, in Motcomb Street, at which point the word inspired the synonym for delivery van, still sometimes used humorously today. (The phrase “pantech truck”, we read, is still in common usage in Australia.)

The Pantechnicon Rooms
10 Motcomb Street
London SW1