Laborde, whose CV includes Le Gavroche and L’Oranger in London and Restaurant Le Louis XV in Monaco. will head up the kitchen at the restaurant, which will open on 20 May. He will be joined by operations director Anton Efimov, formerly of Mari Vanna UK and Raffles Townhouse.
Laborde’s most recent London venture was Chabrot Bistrot d’Amis, which opened in Knightsbridge in 2011 but subsequently closed.
Les Platanes will serve southern French cuisine with a menu ‘featuring contemporary reinventions of classic dishes’. Dishes are set to include starters of warm native lobster salad with fennel and fresh peaches; and warm potato salad, topped with a poached duck egg and Ossetra caviar; while mains will include Cornish turbot with artichokes à la barigoule, sweetbreads, morels and asparagus; and larger sharing dishes such as roast chicken from Gascony, served with foie gras and fine beans.
A 130-bin wine list will have a south of France focus with selections from Bordeaux, Provence and Languedoc and will feature lesser known bottles from small producers.
Located in a nineteenth century town house that was previously home to Black Sea cuisine restaurant Babel House, Les Platanes takes its name from the French for ‘plane trees’.