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JB Requien was working the floor at Le Pont de la Tour when Gordon Ramsay came in for dinner. He had no idea who he was. By the next morning, he was being offered a job at Claridge’s.

The Thesleff Group COO joins Antoine Melon and Gideon Lask to talk about growing up in a Lyon restaurant family, doing homework in the dining room and choosing hospitality despite his mother’s warnings. There’s also a year in Bradford, his first impression of Antoine at Coq d’Argent, and the uncle who decided to hand back his Michelin stars.

JB takes us through Claridge’s, New York, Los Angeles and running the restaurant on The F Word — including the television opportunity he might have handled differently. We discuss consistency, spotting exceptional people and what makes a restaurant worth returning to.

Then comes Under Pressure: an imaginary Saturday night involving Céline Dion without a booking, a departing head chef, children in pyjamas and a disputed bottle of wine. A power-cut question prompts a real story about the night the heating failed at Le Pont de la Tour.

Along the way: Higher Farm ketchup, Beefbar at Dear Jackie, Natalie Coleman’s cooking at The Garrison and a plea for food sponsors for the Women in Art Prize.

Natalie Coleman, Head Chef at The Garrison — the chef Gideon promised to name in the notes.

https://www.thegarrison.co.uk/

Higher Farm — Antoine’s ketchup discovery.

https://www.higher-farm.co.uk/pages/about-us

Beefbar at Dear Jackie, Broadwick Soho.

https://www.broadwicksoho.com/beefbar

Women in Art Prize — get in touch with Gideon if you can help with food sponsorship.

https://womeninartprizecic.com/

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What should £2,000 a night actually buy you?

Gaudéric Harang has worked with Fairmont, Anantara, Six Senses and The Ritz-Carlton Yacht Collection. He joins Antoine Melon and Gideon Lask to talk about the people and decisions behind a stay that feels worth it.

We get into rising room rates, the economics of running a hotel, and why giving a good team room to think matters so much. Gaudéric tells us about a guest who extended his stay just to say goodbye to a member of staff, while a discussion about hotel merchandise reveals quite how much a cap can say about you.

There’s also the warmth of a family table, a disastrous anniversary dinner, and a shared despair at airport hospitality.

Then we put him Under Pressure with an imaginary hotel: Tom Cruise wants a suite when every room is taken, a regular refuses to pay after a two-week stay, and a guest hasn’t emerged from their room. Gaudéric talks through what he would do, who he would protect and when privacy has to give way to a welfare check.

We finish with his case for small, personal hotels with an owner’s heart in them.

Mentioned in the episode

YOLO Journal — Yolanda Edwards

Unreasonable Hospitality — Will Guidara

Chalong Bay Rum

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“Be the party. Don’t join the party.”

Max Harrison joins Antoine Melon and Gideon Lask to talk about a life spent reading people and bringing them together, from London’s clubs and the Golden Heart pub to Hoi Polloi and Chiltern Firehouse.

We hear what Sandra Esquilant taught him about hospitality, how he plans those apparently chance encounters across a dining room, and why a restaurant can feel like a film being cast. Max also talks about the opportunities hospitality offers young people and the quiet he needs after a night of being permanently switched on.

Max admits he loves “barely controlled chaos”, so we put him Under Pressure with an imaginary Saturday night: Madonna arrives with 20 people and no reservation, the head chef walks out, and a favourite guest brings four children in pyjamas.

There’s also a £50 cigarette, the pleasure of being welcomed by name, and a surprisingly persuasive case for serving Minstrels with the coffee.

Mentioned in the episode: Knives and Spoons — Alasdair Gill

https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/alasdair-gill/knives-and-spoons/9781037401435

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Some people build brands.

Some people shape entire categories.

Claire Warner has spent twenty-five years doing both — while asking a harder question: what does hospitality actually do for the people in the room?

At LVMH, she helped reposition Belvedere Vodka and led the creation of its Single Estate Rye series. She launched Drink, Eat, Live, one of the drinks industry’s earliest platforms for mindful drinking and bartender wellbeing. Then, with Seedlip founder Ben Branson, she co-founded Æcorn Aperitifs — creating the world’s first non-alcoholic aperitif and helping define a new category.

As Head of Luxury Advocacy at Diageo, Claire worked across one of the world’s leading drinks portfolios and helped shape its positive drinking agenda.

Today, through Good Measure Guild, she is turning twenty-five years of experience into something even more ambitious: a measurable way to understand, design and defend the social-health impact of the places where people gather.

This conversation is about connection.

How hospitality can make people healthier, happier and less alone.

Why the drinks industry must ask harder questions of itself.

And why the spaces where we gather are not a luxury, but essential social infrastructure.

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Some people build businesses.

Some people build culture.

Neena Jivraj Stevenson has spent her career doing both.

From Deloitte and Harvard Business School to Queensway and The Sloane Club, she's helped shape organisations where culture isn't just talked about — it's lived.

This conversation is about belonging.

How great teams are built.
How values survive pressure.
And why culture is something you create every single day.

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Some people build restaurants.

Some people host events.

Stephen Chenery has spent more than thirty years bringing people together.

From running restaurants in California, Chelsea and the City of London to building Steam Bar & Restaurant into one of the City's best-loved independent venues, Stephen has always believed hospitality is about relationships.

Alongside that, he's spent more than twenty-five years interviewing some of the biggest names in sport, creating conversations people genuinely want to be part of.

This conversation is about community.

How loyalty is earned.

Why people come back.

And how making people feel welcome has shaped an entire career.

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Some people spend their careers following trends.

Some seem to arrive just before them.

Sean Coogan has spent the last fifteen years around some of hospitality’s most talked-about openings.

From Boundary and Chiltern Firehouse to Hoxton Hotels, Ennismore and Maison Estelle, he’s built a career helping create places people genuinely want to be part of.

This conversation is about openings.

How culture gets built.
How standards survive growth.
And why some hospitality businesses become part of the conversation while others disappear.

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Some people build restaurants.
Some people build hotels.

Clémence de Crecy has spent nearly three decades helping people discover them.

From Evolv, Aqua & Gordon Ramsay Restaurants and luxury resorts across the Maldives and Turkey to some of the most respected brands in food, drink and travel, she has built a career around reputation, storytelling and connection.

What began with Champagne and luxury brands became Clementine Communications — one of London's most respected boutique hospitality agencies.

This conversation is about visibility.

How great brands earn attention.
How reputations are built.
And why even the best hospitality businesses need someone to tell their story.

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Some people build hospitality around service.
Some build it around status.

Sue Walter has spent her career building it around people.

From The Hospital Club and Coppa Club to Maggie & Rose and The Roof Gardens, Sue has led some of the most distinctive hospitality businesses in the UK and beyond.

But her story starts long before hospitality — in government, policing, arts, education and private equity — learning how organisations work, how cultures form, and why people choose to belong.

This conversation is about community.

How you create it.
How you scale it.
And why the strongest hospitality brands are often built around something much bigger than food, drink or design.

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Some people run restaurants.
Others define service.

Paulo de Tarso has spent his career focused on the craft of hospitality itself.

From The Wolseley and Scott’s to opening Bar Boulud London under Daniel Boulud, his reputation has been built on standards, warmth and front-of-house excellence at the very highest level.

Later, as founder of Margot in Covent Garden and as a TEDx speaker, he brought those ideas into something of his own — shaping not just restaurants, but conversations around hospitality and human connection.

This conversation is about service.

Not as performance —
but as connection.

And why guests remember how a place made them feel long after they’ve forgotten what they ate.