Squatters take over Marco Pierre White’s old London restaurant just days after setting up residence at Gordon Ramsay’s former pub
Hundreds of squatters have taken over celebrity chef Marco Pierre White’s former London restaurant, just days after others moved into Gordon Ramsey’s pub.
As many as 400 people have been seen taking over and throwing parties at the site of the now-shuttered Steak, Pizza and Gin House in London’s tourist hotspot Leicester Square since last week, according to The Evening Standard.
“They have put big padlocks on the doors,” one delivery driver said of the prime real estate.
They also put up a sign saying they could not be moved without a court order since the shuttered restaurant was vacant and was not being used for residential purposes.
“It’s one of the best buildings on the square, they are properly barricaded in,” a local business owner also told the London paper.
“They put the sign on the door about their legal rights. They obviously know what they are doing.”
Joe Waller, the manager of a restaurant next door, told the Standard people were lined up in the back trying to get in the taken-over building.
“The squatters have chosen a very nice building,” he said, calling it “not ideal.”
The restaurant closed its doors in February, supposedly just for temporary maintenance work, according to the Telegraph.
Heaps of garbage then started piling up by the back entrance, according to Ellen Leyco, the manager of a restaurant next door who alerted the local council.
Authorities investigated and found about 400 people inside the building, she said.
London’s Metropolitan Police moved in to secure the five-story building by Tuesday, according to the Telegraph.
Squatting a non-residential property without the owner’s consent is not considered a crime in the UK, but police can take action if crimes are subsequently committed — such as property damage or theft, the Independent noted.
The takeover came after squatters also took over Gordon Ramsay’s $16.1 million York & Albany pub, which he was about to sign over to new partners in a multi-million dollar deal.
The group claimed to have occupied the British restaurant as a form of protest for the “victims of gentrification” and the country’s high-speed railway, H2S. It was not immediately clear if the group was tied to those at Marco Pierre White’s former restaurant.
But they were forced out on Tuesday, saying they hoped “to be a part of the community again soon.”
Another London pub owner, who said he saw squatters take over his own joint for eight weeks last year, now says squatting in pubs is “on the rise” in the city, blaming Mayor Sadiq Khan’s soft-on-crime approach.
“They have traditionally chosen empty warehouses and buildings, but clearly they have realized now that pubs and hotels are a lot more comfortable,” Howard Thacker told The Telegraph.
Police who are called to the scene then tell angry locals that unless they can prove the squatters broke into the property, they are powerless to do anything, he said.
“It feels a bit like it’s part of lawless London,” Thacker said.
“Anything less than a major crime doesn’t seem to matter to police.”
