Italian restaurant selects Sheffield’s Fox Valley for its first venture outside London

Italian restaurant selects Sheffield’s Fox Valley for its first venture outside London

20 January 2016

London based Ponti’s Italian Kitchen has announced its first opening outside the capital – with a new Italian restaurant planned at north Sheffield’s Fox Valley development later this year.

The family run firm has successful restaurants on Duke Street and Oxford Street in London’s West End and will be bringing its unique take on premium casual Italian dining to Sheffield when the new £50 million town centre development opens in June.

Headed by Stefano Ispani, Ponti’s Italian Kitchen has its culinary heritage from the town of Piacenza in Northern Italy - the birthplace of designer Giorgio Armani.

The town, in the food heart of Italy’s Emilia-Romagna region, remains a significant source of culinary inspiration for their menu whilst long-standing personal relationships with a number of other family run producers from the area adds a real authenticity to the dishes that are created. 

Stefano’s family opened their first caffè business when they moved from Piacenza to London in 1963 and the company is now looking forward to bringing the Ponti’s Italian Kitchen experience to Yorkshire.

The Ponti’s Italian Kitchen restaurant will continue to provide an all day offering and have around 150 covers spread over 4,750 sq. ft. on two floors.

It will feature a fabulous award winning “Perini & Perini” Spumante bar with a balcony as well as a private dining room above the ground floor restaurant – all beautifully designed to bring a genuine taste and warm experience of Italy to north Sheffield.

The restaurant interior is designed by the award winning northern interior designer Simon McIlwraith of Collective Design.

The restaurant has also been styled to benefit from the building’s south facing aspect at Fox Valley with an attractive outdoor seating area featuring specially designed outdoor fire pits set around the garden and fountain area to enable dining almost all year round.

Stefano said: “We have been looking to find the right landlord to partner with in a location for our first Ponti’s Italian Kitchen outside London. ’’

"With Mark Dransfield and the Fox Valley development we believe we have a perfect partnership; it really is the ideal spot for a new development in a beautiful location in north Sheffield. ’’

"We are creating the authentic feel of a real Italian kitchen with the warmth and passion for fantastic “home cooking” which goes with that. Our guests appreciate that we have a keen eye for detail and that will be evident throughout the design, layout and of course the food and customer service. ‘’

"This is a wonderful opportunity for us to design and develop our restaurant from the ground up and have an influence on the way the building functions. This is our first restaurant outside London and we are very proud to be working with the Fox Valley team who share our vision and commitment for quality in everything they do and how they work.”

Mark Dransfield, Managing Director of Dransfield Properties, developers of the Fox Valley scheme, said: “We have sought from the outset to create something really unique and different here at Fox Valley and Ponti’s Italian Kitchen is definitely a big part of that.’’

"Stefano took us to see the region of Italy where his family and local producers are from and we all came away absolutely overwhelmed by the local cuisine and quality of produce.’’

"To meet their suppliers and see the vision and attention to detail which goes into every dish is fantastic and we are delighted that Stefano and his team have chosen Fox Valley for their first restaurant outside London.”

As well as the new Ponti’s restaurant Fox Valley will be home to a host of High Street names and a new boutique department store. Full Gas Bikes is also opening its first store at the town centre development.

Fox Valley is creating a new town centre in north Sheffield with 32 new retail and restaurant units as well as high spec office space and a housing development with 114 homes.

Ponti’s Italian Kitchen was advised by the London based firm of Chartered Surveyors and Property Consultants Stephen Kane and Company.

Picture shows:

Stefano (centre) with Desiree Carrino (left) and Wojciech Plis (right) at the Oxford Street restaurant in London.

To find out more about Ponti’s Italian Kitchen visit www.pontisitaliankitchen.co.uk and for more information about the Fox Valley development visit www.foxvalleysheffield.co.uk

For further information, contact:

Public Relations Department, Dransfield Properties Ltd
Tel: 01226 360644
Email: pr@dransfield.co.uk