Longstanding Eton restaurant announces closure after 50th anniversary

A longstanding Eton restaurant has announced its closure – days after celebrating its 50th anniversary.

Gilbey's Bar, Restaurant & Townhouse hosted a champagne-filled three-course meal celebration for its 50th golden anniversary on Saturday (June 7).

Today (Tuesday), owner Lin Gilbey announced her retirement after 50 years at the helm and confirmed their last trading day will be Sunday, July 27.

In a statement, Lin said it was time ‘to bring my life's work to an end’ and bid farewell to the ‘wonderful’ customers who supported the establishment ‘in both guises’.

The Eton Wine Bar was opened by brothers Michael and Bill Gilbey along with their wives, Lin and Caroline, in 1975.

It transformed into Gilbey's Bar, Restaurant & Townhouse in 2000.

Their family descends from brothers Walter and Arthur Gilbey, the 19th-century wine and spirits merchants behind one of the world’s oldest drinks manufacturers, Gilbey’s.

Although the second pair of brothers didn’t achieve ‘global domination’ like their ancestors from four generations ago, Lin said they made a ‘significant mark’ in Windsor and Eton.

Bill and Caroline retired in 2014, and Lin's husband, Michael, died in 2022, leaving her the ‘only one person left holding the reins’. 

Lin promised to keep the business running until the 50th anniversary, and ‘for personal reasons’ now wants to ‘draw this to a close’.

“It’s a bittersweet moment for me – a golden wedding anniversary of anything is quite a milestone to hit,” Lin told the Express.

“I love the business and I love what I do, but I’m not bionic. I’ve worked my socks off for 50 years,” she said.

“I feel I kept my promise to Michael, but for a variety of reasons, life isn’t getting easier for independent restaurateurs. It’s getting tougher all the time.

“It’s going to be very strange letting go of this. It’s my life’s work. I’m 72, and I started the business when I was 22.

“I cracked on through so many different changes, transformations, fashions, highs and lows, so I feel I’m embedded in the buildings and those rooms.

“It’s very collaborative owning a restaurant; everybody contributes to our success and has done so over the years, but all good things have to come to an end.”

In the first few decades after opening, the French-inspired Eton Wine Bar was a ‘trendy’ venue operating ‘in an era when nobody knew what a wine bar was’ – including the licensing authorities.

“We had such a nightmare getting a licence [for] glasses of wine without being accompanied by food," said Lin.

“But we wanted to open a space where women felt comfortable to meet, greet, drink, and socialise because the only alternative in those days was grotty old pubs.

“It was the beginning of a female-led idea, but of course it appealed in the end to everyone.”

Lin said the popularity of their wine bar ‘tailed off’ with the rise of cheap foreign travel, prompting them to ‘alter course’ and become a restaurant.

“Food, drinks and wine are as fashion-led as clothing, furniture and design. If we didn’t keep abreast of changing tastes, demands and fashions, we would have died a death a long time ago," she said.

“We had to keep up, keep ahead and keep our customers interested and coming back.

“We’ve succeeded in that, and that’s why it’s good to go out on a high, knowing that we delivered what was asked of us and more.”

Lin said many factors were ‘conspiring to give me a kick to go’ and contributed to her decision, including Brexit, the COVID pandemic, the war in Ukraine and the cost-of-living crisis.

“The final straw which made me think, let’s do 50 years and then I’m off was the last budget when the national insurance hike came in. Minimum wage soared, and people were feeling the pinch,” she said.

“We are independent through and through, but we get no support, which contributes to my feeling of 'time to call it a day'.”

Lin believes their retention of long-serving chefs and front and back of house teams is a ‘good record’ of a family-led establishment that has ‘always cared’.

“People just know it. We wouldn’t have been there for 50 years if that hadn’t been felt,” she added.

“That comes from being a family-owned, long-established, much-respected, family-run restaurant, and we’re a dying breed.

“We can have a wonderful wine list, a wonderful menu, but I think the core has been the team that looks after our guests and customers.

“We’ve all been blessed with everyone that works with us – they’re part of the extended family.”