Clove Club founder Isaac McHale to open Bar Valette

Isaac McHale, co-founder of the two-Michelin-starred Clove Club, is to open a new European restaurant in London next year.

Bar Valette will launch in January in the space once occupied by Two Lights, the restaurant backed by the Clove Club team, on Kingsland Road in Shoreditch.

It comes a month after the Clove Club trio (McHale, Johnny Smith and Daniel Willis) announced they were parting ways and dividing the business, with McHale becoming sole owner of the original Clove Club restaurant in Shoreditch Town Hall.

His new venture will take cues from southern French and simple Spanish cooking and is billed as a more casual restaurant for “dinners fuelled by wine and sherry”. Some ideas from the Clove Club’s back catalogue will influence the menu, including its buttermilk fried chicken in pine.

The 40-cover dining room will feature an open kitchen, while tables will be topped with paper tablecloths and bistro-style curtains will hang in the windows. Bar Valette will not offer lunch, with opening hours listed as 6pm – 11pm Tuesday to Saturday.