Hugh Allen, the wunderkind Australian chef who earned three hats – the nation’s highest restaurant score – at Vue de Monde earlier than his twenty seventh birthday, is on a mission. And now, barely 30, he has remodeled a rundown pavilion in Melbourne’s Fitzroy Gardens into Yiaga, a soigné 44-seat restaurant centered on native substances and native farms.
Yiaga, Melbourne
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
The location has served refreshment since 1908, first because the Kiosk tearooms, changed by the Pavilion café within the Sixties, earlier than ceasing buying and selling a number of years in the past. Allen found the area throughout Melbourne’s first lockdown in 2019, recognising it as the right spot for his debut solo enterprise.
Working with famend native architect John Wardle, Allen preserved solely the present roof and construction whereas reimagining every part beneath. ‘Hugh was eager on an ‘Australian zen’ heat to the interiors,’ says Wardle, including that the collaboration led to a deep friendship solid via a shared ardour for makers and making. For starters, Allen insisted that the method to Yiaga ought to matter as a lot because the meal itself.
Within the native Wurundjeri language, yiaga means ‘search and discover’, a reference to the journey of discovery that diners should undertake via Victorian-era gardens previous tree-lined avenues, lake and conservatory, presumably glimpsing possums, lorikeets and microbats alongside the best way earlier than arriving ultimately at Wardle’s modern, low-slung pile. This layered arrival sequence – backyard to path to doorway to portal to reception to cellar – amplifies the event via deliberate pacing, every transition getting ready diners for the subsequent expertise whereas respecting the edge between public backyard and personal feast.
Comprising greater than 13,000 terracotta tiles crafted by Robert Gordon, Yiaga’s entrance was designed by John Wardle and Simon Lloyd to imitate the bark of the encircling century-old Scottish elm timber
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
The doorway instructions consideration. Designed by Wardle and Simon Lloyd, and crafted by ceramicist Robert Gordon, greater than 13,000 individually fashioned tiles curve across the inside partitions, their terracotta texture mimicking the bark of the encircling Scottish elm timber. Wardle says, ‘the tiles had been sketched, then modelled as much as develop a single one which might be fashioned across the various contours’.
Ground-to-ceiling glazing dissolves the boundary between eating room and backyard, and the vast majority of diners face in the direction of the open kitchen relatively than the view on the premise that Allen didn’t need servers interrupting conversations or sight strains to debate menus or ship plates.
The fabric palette attracts solely from native craftsmanship. Furnishings maker Ross Thompson formed blackwood timber into the cellar and drinks trolley, whereas designer Jon Goulder crafted customized chairs constructed for lingering. The personal eating desk, created by Vivienne Wong from cypress timber planted by one Baron Ferdinand von Mueller within the 1800s, connects diners to the positioning’s colonial heritage. Glass artist Alexandra Hirst fashioned the eating glassware by hand, and metalsmith Tobi Bockholt solid the kitchen knives.
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
Ceramic tableware by Jacqueline Clayton and Paul Davis sits subsequent to vases by Ridgeline Pottery in a blackwood timber cupboard constructed by Ross Thompson
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
This dedication to put extends to Allen’s menu. Retired Blackmore Wagyu breeding cows, prized for his or her depth of flavour after lives spent grazing pastures, floor the protein choices. Foraged wakame seaweed surfaces in desserts, whereas Gippsland dairy enriches dishes with Victorian terroir, and Queensland’s coral trout carries the heat of northern waters south. Native herbs – river mint and Geraldton waxflower, amongst them – fragrance plates with distinctly Australian aromatics. These substances kind the spine of Yiaga’s single-sitting service every night.
And the absence of desk turnover permits Allen’s staff of 12 cooks to work at a extra measured tempo. ‘All tables are equal, none extra particular than others,’ says Wardle. This democratic method extends to the views: each seat gives related views of the kitchen and the backyard. Although each are worthy of your undivided consideration, this might make for a tough night.
The personal eating space, the place a handblown glass ‘Kindling’ pendant by Adam Markowitz and Ruth Allen hangs above a cypress desk by Vivienne Wong
(Picture credit score: Courtesy of Anson Good)
Yiaga is positioned at Fitzroy Gardens, Melbourne 3002, Australia.
This text seems within the January 2026 Subsequent Era Concern of Wallpaper*, obtainable in print on newsstands, on the Wallpaper* app on Apple iOS, and to subscribers of Apple Information +. Subscribe to Wallpaper* immediately.
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