Prominent Italian restaurant to close at Crown Melbourne ahead of dining overhaul

Italian restaurant Rosetta, located at Crown Melbourne and originally part of Neil Perry’s hospitality portfolio, is closing on May 19 after Crown chose not to renew its lease. Opening in its place is a bar, The Henley at Crown Melbourne, the first new venue that’s part of the casino’s redevelopment announced in November.

Rosetta’s operator, Hunter St Hospitality, said the 12-year-old restaurant was on a month-to-month lease for the past four years as Crown firmed up its redevelopment plans under new owners Blackstone. The private equity fund bought Crown Resorts in June 2022.

“We’ve been month-to-month for some time while Crown was still deciding what their development plans looked like,” said Frank Tucker, group chief operating officer of Hunter St Hospitality.

“Certainly, through COVID, that probably slowed their plans down quite a bit. Now that we’re firmly out of COVID, the resort has come back and said they have plans for that space [Rosetta].”

Rosetta’s closure comes after major staff cuts across Hunter St Hospitality in February, including making culinary director Corey Costelloe redundant, amid reports by The Australian Financial Review that parent company Pacific Hunter was reviewing its portfolio after two consecutive years of losses totalling more than $150 million.

The February announcement of staff cuts triggered rumours that Rockpool Bar & Grill in Melbourne would close in May when its lease at Crown ended.

Asked on Tuesday about the status of Rockpool’s lease, Tucker said a new lease extension had just been signed with Crown, although he would not share the length of that lease. That and fellow Hunter St Hospitality restaurant Spice Temple are both on fixed-term leases at Crown, according to Tucker.

“In an ideal world, I’d like to have space when they [Crown] release their redevelopment plans,” he said. “I’d like to put in a new concept or another one of our concepts. But we continue to wait and see.

“We believe [Rockpool] is the flagship restaurant in the resort there.”

In November, Crown’s new owners announced a major overhaul of its Melbourne property, including reinvigorated dining and bars. However, Crown has yet to release a timeline for the plans and did not respond to questions from this masthead about timing.

The Henley, described as a world-class riverside bar named after the Henley-on-Yarra rowing regattas, is the first detail of the plans to be released.

“The announcement ... signifies the start of what is to come for Crown,” said Crown chief executive Mike Volkert in a statement.

“We are looking to create a portfolio of restaurants and bars that bring together the best culinary and bartender talent from across the world combined with the best local talent and inimitable Melbourne flavour to create the city’s most sought-after hospitality destination.”

Staff at Rosetta are being redeployed to the group’s other high-end Melbourne restaurants, Spice Temple, Sake and Rockpool Bar & Grill.

Meanwhile, Tucker said another Rosetta was unlikely to surface, spelling the end for the high-end Italian restaurant that Neil Perry opened in Melbourne in 2012 and in Sydney in 2017. The latter closed in 2021.

Perry’s suite of restaurants was merged with Urban Purveyor Group in 2016, backed by private equity firm Quadrant, but the partnership dissolved in 2020 and Perry walked away. His restaurants were absorbed into a premium arm of the renamed Pacific Hunter Group.

Pacific Hunter’s most recent financial statements, lodged with the regulator in December 2022, included a cautionary note from auditors about the company’s future. Asked about the auditors’ comments, Tucker said: “I just don’t think that’s an accurate description. I don’t know which auditors anybody’s been speaking to.”

He feels bullish about the premium portfolio (which is covered by Hunter St Hospitality) and hopes to open a Spice Temple and Sake in Perth, and a second Sake in Melbourne.

Crown said The Henley would open in late 2024.

Rosetta continues to trade until Sunday, May 19.

Crown Riverwalk, 8 Whiteman Street, Southbank, rosettarestaurant.com.au

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