Six Storeys is such a fantastic concept, you wonder why other venues haven’t formulated similar ideas. It is situated in a famous townhouse in Soho square and houses a bar, restaurant, dance floor and event spaces. Even though you might be going along just to check out their dining options or for a quiet drink, it is highly recommended that you climb each floor and experience the quirky delights on each storey.
The Study on the 5th floor has some of the most sumptuous wallpaper you will see anywhere in Soho and harks back to a bygone era. The company that designed the wallpaper, William Morris did start back in the 1860s.
There are spaces for you to let your hair down, like the Decantery on the 4th floor, where their bartenders can pour some of their expertly brewed in-house spirits and you can dance away on their light-up dancefloor. You have to make time to try out their quince and blue cheese gin and tonic.
Back down on the 2nd floor at the Parlour restaurant, we sampled their classic British menu. Truffled Somerset Brie was charred but curiously left long enough at room temperature for it to be served cold, but you can’t really go wrong with truffle and cheese. Six Storeys scotch egg was well-portioned with the egg-yolk golden orange and cooked to just the right temperature. As the waiter kindly pointed out, the eggs were from hens grown on HRH the Prince of Wales’s farm.
Main courses were more high-quality gastropub-style offerings. The fishcakes I tried were firm with a thin crispy coating and well flavoured by the accompaniments of avocado mayonnaise and heritage tomato relish. They didn’t skimp on the garnish, as I had a whole forest of roquette leaves.
Likewise, my guest’s superfood salad had an abundance of premium ingredients like tenderstem broccoli, roasted butternut, sprouted seeds, spinach and superseeds. Just for good measure, he braved the small supplement and added on the grilled halloumi.
Desserts are served in quaint pudding jars. Whilst I thoroughly enjoyed my lemon posset which was also a great palate cleanser, the only misstep of the night happened with my guest’s Bananarama dessert. The toffee, custard and freeze dried berries tasted intensely bitter rather than sweet. I must credit their front of house team, who went into the kitchen spoke with the chef and tried it out herself. She agreed the taste wasn’t right and their explanation was they probably used the wrong ratio of ingredients. Apparently too much of the wrong toffee.
Overall, Six Storeys is a thoroughly enjoyable experience and a venue you could easily spend the whole night at. Maybe they might consider opening a seventh storey with beds?
baldwin@townfish.com