The Oklava founders have launched a campaign on Kickstarter to raise £10,000 in order to install a custom-made cool room in one of the building’s underground vaults to allow the creation of Kiazim's Turkish breads and pastries.
Opening early next year on the site the pair ran as Kyseri, the new venture is described as a move into ‘uncharted territories’, and will serve breakfast, lunch ‘and the best breads and pastries this side of the Bosphorus’.
Kiazim and Laura Christie launched the original Oklava in Shoreditch in 2015 and opened Kyseri in June last year. They announced earlier this year that it was to be turned into a restaurant and bakery.
Any additional money raised by the crowdfunding campaign will be used for the new restaurant, with the pair saying they would use it to buy a ‘fancy dough machine’, a doner kebab machine, ‘some snazzy new outdoor furniture and a take-away hatch’.
Writing on their crowdfunding page they said: “Opening a restaurant in London is not easy. There is a laundry list of hurdles to overcome - ranging from financial challenges, to the vicissitudes of politics, to the sheer amount of day-to-day graft needed to keep a restaurant running. However, in the past four years we have worked very hard to make our restaurants a success, and we are confident we have the team and abilities in place to make Oklava Bakery + Wine a triumph.”
Rewards for pledges include tote bags, a signed Oklava cookbook, lunch and dinner and a year’s supply of baked goods.
Visit the Kickstarter page here.