Shoryu founder and Michelin partner to open Japanese restaurant Sakagura in Mayfair

Sakagura will serve authentic Japanese cuisine and open at the former Strada site at 8 Heddon Street in autumn 2016.

Diners will be able to enjoy sake cocktails and watch chefs cook-up skewer-based dishes known as Hakata yakitori in an open kitchen.

While further menu details are scarce, a statement released to the press indicated that it will be affordably priced to appeal to a younger, more relaxed audience.

Major backers​

Sakagura is the first joint venture between Tokumine’s Japan Centre Group, sake brewers Gekkeikan, and Japanese restaurant group the Toridoll Corporation.

It has the backing of Mayfair's The Araki restaurant, which was awarded two stars in the 2015 Michelin guide.​

The partners have signed a lease with The Crown Estate for the Heddon Street site, which neighbours Gordon Ramsey’s Heddon Street Kitchen and African-inspired Momo.

Tokumine said: "We are really pleased to be bringing this unique and authentic dining and sake experience to this prestigious part of London and joining the thriving dining destination of Heddon Street, alongside other such high calibre restaurants.”

Sakagura’s opening forms part of The Crown Estate’s ongoing £1bn investment in the Regent Street area, which included transforming Heddon Street in to a pedestrianised food quarter in 2008.

Katerina Mercury, asset manager for The Crown Estate’s Regent Street portfolio, said: “Sakagura’s authentic southern Japanese-style cuisine will represent a sensational new dining option for the millions of shoppers, tourists and workers that visit Regent Street annually.

“It will add to the diverse range of cuisines available on Heddon Street and we are enthusiastically awaiting its opening this autumn.”