Muse by Tom Aikens

Muse is Tom Aikens' most personal restaurant, tucked into a converted Georgian mews house on Groom Place, a cobbled Belgravia backstreet a few minutes from Hyde Park Corner. The name is literal: the tasting menu is built from Aikens' own memories, from his childhood and his parents to turning points in a career that made him, at twenty-six, the youngest British chef to hold two Michelin stars. It opened in January 2020 and holds one Michelin star in the 2026 Guide.

The setting is intimate by design, with roughly two dozen covers across a townhouse of just a few rooms. The main dining room curves around a run of banquette seating in soft neutral bouclé, lit by a sculptural chandelier and hung with wavy-edged mirrors, its window looking onto the mews outside. On the ground floor an open kitchen counter seats a handful of guests directly in front of the pass, framed in deep-veined red marble, and a small lounge with a shell-like drinks cabinet holds the arrival and after-dinner moment.

For private events the whole house works as one. Groups take the upstairs dining room, book the chef's counter for a front-row seat on the kitchen, or hire the townhouse in full for complete privacy. It suits a milestone birthday, a close celebration or a considered corporate dinner rather than a large party, and the scale is the point: everyone is in the same room, close to the cooking.