Kent restaurant to close after nearly 50 years in business

The restaurant with rooms, located within Georgian manor house Macknade Manor in Faversham, has experienced 21 consecutive years with a Michelin Star and has won numerous accolades for its cooking.

It will have its last service on 31 August.

Writing on their website, the couple said that “Father Time has finally caught up with us” and that they were closing the restaurant “with both sadness and a hint of trepidation”.

“We have genuinely been dreading this day for some time,” they wrote.

“We promised ourselves we would go out on a high, and with a diary that reads “FULL” for many lunches and dinners into the future, we are sure that such a diary would be the envy of any restaurant in the country.

We have been blessed with the most wonderful and unbelievably loyal staff over the years. To see our current brilliant team broken up is incredibly sad. If it were not for the perils of age, we would continue for another 47 years.

“It is not only our staff who have been incredibly loyal over the years but our customers too, many of whom have become friends. Thank you to each and every one of you for your patronage both here at Macknade and previously at Painters Forstal.”

The Pitchfords launched the restaurant in the Kent village of Painters Forstal in 1977 before moving it to Macknade Manor in 2000.

The couple said that the business will remain in their care for the foreseeable future.

“So, it’s farewell for now, but not goodbye,” they add.

“To paraphrase Winnie the Pooh: “How lucky we are to have something that makes saying farewell so hard.”