Homer Lobster brings its Paris roll to Soho
The lobster roll brand founded in the Marais in 2017 is opening its first permanent site outside France next month, on D'Arblay Street.
The Homer Lobster Soho opening next month marks the brand's first permanent restaurant outside France, nine years after it started as a stall in the Marais. Founder Moïse Sfez, who trained at the Vatel hospitality school and worked for Alain Ducasse, launched Homer Lobster in Paris in 2017 before adding a string of sites across the city and outposts in Saint-Tropez, Cannes and Nice.
The Soho restaurant takes over 98 D'Arblay Street, previously home to the matcha brand Happiness, and follows a pop-up Homer Lobster ran on the South Bank last year. Sfez has also taken the brand's rolls to pop-ups and events as far afield as Monaco and Maine.
The signature dish is a warm, house-made brioche bun brushed with melted butter and filled with lobster dressed in a mayonnaise built around a secret spice blend, finished with lime and chives. A tuna melt made with tuna belly and house-smoked Norwegian salmon pastrami sits alongside it, and Sologne caviar can be added to any sandwich on the menu.
This city lives and breathes food, and it understands a truly great sandwich when it sees one.
“Bringing Homer Lobster to London has always been a dream,” Sfez said of the opening. “This city lives and breathes food, and it understands a truly great sandwich when it sees one.”
The restaurant gives no seating count or prices, but the brand's Paris sites run as fast-casual counters rather than full dining rooms, a format Soho's narrow streets suit well.
A ninth year, a first permanent site abroad
Homer Lobster's expansion has so far stayed close to the French coast, with Saint-Tropez, Cannes and Nice following the original Marais stall. London is the first market the brand has committed to with a lease rather than a pop-up, a step up from the one-off events in Monaco and the US.
That caution mirrors how several French food brands have approached the UK this year: a residency or a guest slot first, a permanent address only once demand is proven. Carrot, a London-style tearoom, took the same test before opening permanently in Paris, just in the opposite direction.
Soho's seafood counter gets company
Soho and the surrounding streets have added several seafood-led openings this year, among them Wright Brothers' new oyster restaurant in Covent Garden, suggesting London's appetite for simple, product-led seafood formats is broader than any one neighbourhood.
Whether Homer Lobster's Paris following travels with it is the open question; London has no shortage of lobster rolls already, and Sfez's bet is that a brioche bun and a secret spice blend will be enough to stand out.
