The couples who run restaurants together (and somehow stay together)

They say you should never work with family, but these couples clearly didn’t get the message. From dodging kitchen rows to sneaking in date nights between services, four hospitality power duos chat to Hannah Twiggs about how they keep their restaurants – and their relationships – thriving under pressure. Running a restaurant is no small feat. Running a restaurant with your life partner? That’s a whole different level of madness. It’s not just about nailing the perfect dish or managing a packed service – it’s about doing it all while navigating the quirks, habits and occasional chaos of your significant other. There’s no hiding a bad mood when you’re stuck in the kitchen with no escape.

We spoke to four hospitality power couples about the reality of mixing business with romance, the highs and lows of working together and how they keep the spark alive beyond the pass. “We met when we were both working at Petersham Nurseries in Covent Garden,” says Aaron Potter, who co-founded Wildflowers with his partner, Laura Hart. “Laura was the retail manager of the shop and I was the head chef of one of the restaurants.” Aaron had always dreamed of opening his own restaurant: “It just felt natural to do it with Laura. Her creativity and eye for detail means we have been able to create a space that feels like us.".

For James Knappett and Sandia Chang of two Michelin-star Kitchen Table, their love story began with a bold move – quite literally, in the middle of a service. “We met working together at Per Se restaurant in New York City. At that time, I was working as a back server and just arrived a year later on a 1.5-year training visa from England,” says Sandia. “James was very vocal and with the accent, it was hard not to notice! He asked me out whilst I was clearing plates in the dish area, so that his head chef wouldn’t see him flirting with girls during service.” Smooth? Maybe not. Effective? Clearly.

Aushi and Eroshan Meewella, the husband-and-wife team behind Kolamba and Kolamba East, first crossed paths 24 years ago at a dinner in Little Italy. “Eroshan was a friend of my sister’s and I happened to be visiting from university,” Aushi recalls. “We had worked together prior to Kolamba (as he worked in property and I am an interior designer) and the partnership seemed to work – so we thought, why not!”.

For Roisin Stimpson and Edmund Weil, the dream was there from the very start. “We both always loved hosting, vintage design and old-school jazz music (Rosie is also a jazz singer),” they explain. “Since we first got together at university in Dublin more than 20 years ago, we dreamed of a speakeasy/cabaret bar which would resurrect the old-school glamour of the Twenties and Thirties. It’s a dream we were lucky enough to fulfil when we opened Nightjar in 2010.”.

It takes a particular kind of dynamic to work alongside a partner day in, day out, and still want to sit down for dinner together at the end of it. “The best part about working with your partner is the trust we have in each other,” says Sandia. “We know that we will always have each other’s back in any challenging circumstances. We know that we will never sabotage each other and that we will always want the best for each other. We challenge each other but for the same mutual purpose of helping each other become better.”.

Aaron agrees, adding: “There are many great things about working together – firstly that we actually get to see each other! It also means we both have each other for support. When one of us is having a tough day, the other one knows how to intervene or lift some of that pressure off.”. That trust, and a clear sense of direction, is something Aaron and Laura also credit for their ability to work together. “We’re lucky that we haven’t had many disagreements, largely because we share such a clear vision of what we want to achieve with the restaurant and tend to think similarly,” Aaron says. “Of course, small differences in opinion crop up now and then, but we trust each other’s instincts. We’ve also learnt when to table a discussion and revisit it later, rather than pressing the point to the stage of conflict.”.

For Roisin and Edmund, the biggest challenge is financial pressure. “The most challenging thing is probably the fact that our financial fates are entwined, which rather puts the pressure on to make things work. If one of us fails, we both fail!” It’s a sentiment echoed by Aushi, who acknowledges that their business is something that extends beyond working hours. “Being an entrepreneur means you work 24/7 – even when on holiday, we never switch off as it’s our business and our reputation. But we are trying to get better at it by hiring really capable team players who see themselves as vested in these businesses as we are.”.