Minor Hotels to reopen Dukes London in Q2 2027
The St James's hotel, famous for its tableside martinis since 1908, returns as a Minor Reserve Collection property with a new restaurant from Wolseley Hospitality Group.
Minor Hotels will reopen Dukes London, the St James's hotel that has mixed martinis since 1908, in the second quarter of 2027 under its Minor Reserve Collection brand, adding a restaurant run by Wolseley Hospitality Group.
The 85-key hotel is being renovated by Russell Sage Studio and will return with 13 executive suites and 5 signature suites. Dukes Bar, the hotel's martini bar, has stayed open throughout the building work, alongside the Delaney Drawing Room lounge and its list of 160 whiskies.
The Wolseley Hospitality Group restaurant is new to the property. The group already runs nine dining rooms across the capital, among them The Wolseley, The Delaunay and Brasserie Zedel, including some of the names on Amuse's list of London's best tables, and the Dukes site becomes its first address inside a hotel rather than a standalone dining room.
A martini bar older than the hotel chain now running it: Dukes keeps the harder trick for last.
Why Dukes London, why now
Minor already has a working relationship with Dukes as a brand: Seven Tides, the Dubai-based developer, appointed Minor Hotels to manage Dukes The Palm, a Royal Hideaway hotel on Palm Jumeirah, in 2025. The London reopening extends that track record to the brand's original address.
“Bringing Minor Reserve Collection to the UK through Dukes London is a defining moment for the brand,” said William E Heinecke, Minor International's chairman.
Minor's bigger London bet
The group now runs more than 640 properties across 67 countries, and Dukes London is not its only UK move this quarter: Minor is also opening its first Colbert Collection hotel, at the WestDill Mayfair, in the fourth quarter of 2026. Minor entered the UK in 2022 by buying Corbin & King, the operator behind Wolseley Hospitality Group, for £60m, a group founded by restaurateurs Chris Corbin and Jeremy King, who reopened The Wolseley on Piccadilly in 2003. That purchase put London's wider hospitality finances under the same kind of scrutiny Minor's hotel arm now faces.
Whether a 118-year-old address can carry a new brand name without losing the bar regulars is the open question for 2027.
