Part deli, part restaurant and part wine bar, Clara’s will serve specialty coffee, sandwiches and items to cook at home by day, before transitioning into a Mediterranean-inspired wine bar and dining room in the evening.
George Hartshorn, Louis Hartshorn and Brian Hook have invested £200,000 into a site on Bethnal Green Road that has stood vacant for more than a decade.
Day-to-day operations will be overseen by general manager Rochelle Hutchinson, formerly of the River Café, while the kitchen will be headed by Eli Fourcroy, whose three-year tenure at Artusi in Peckham saw the restaurant awarded a Michelin Bib Gourmand in 2025.
His Mediterranean-inspired menu will celebrate island and coastal cuisines, with dishes including conejo en salmorejo, manchego fritti and Clara’s “unique take on salad Niçoise”.
The wine list will focus on low-intervention and artisanal producers from the UK and Europe, supplied by Les Caves de Pyrene, Tutto Wines, Ancestral Wines and newcomer importer Nabeeth Wines, which works with producers from Palestine.
Clara’s will launch with a 16-strong opening team and a business model designed to balance retail and dining equally, with revenue split 50/50 between the two.
The deli is expected to see an average basket spend of £15, while evening service aims for £36 per head, driving a forecast weekly turnover of £40k and annual revenue of £2m.
The team has also repurposed equipment from The Farrier, which closed late last year after three years of trading.
“Shoreditch has some of the most exciting restaurants in the UK right now – from Brat to Singburi – but this corner of Hackney doesn’t yet have a dedicated deli or wine bar. Clara’s fills both gaps, offering restaurant-quality ingredients for retail and a dining experience that blurs the line between deli and wine bar,” Hartshorn says.
Clara’s is set to launch on 17 October.