RWK Goodman helps secure new home for Soho legend Darjeeling Express

The new home at 2A Garrick Street, Covent Garden, owned and managed by Capco, will be a restaurant and incubator for training female hospitality staff to forge careers in the industry.

RWK Goodman, which is based in the City and has a strong reputation in the leisure and hospitality sector, has advised Darjeeling Express on both its current lease at Soho's Kingly Court and on securing the new site in the heart of Covent Garden.

The new 5,770sq ft restaurant will feature a much larger kitchen to allow the chef-restaurateur to employ and train a greater number of female staff into senior leadership roles in the restaurant industry.

Asma Khan said: "The kitchen at our home in Kingly Court was just too small to achieve everything I have planned for Darjeeling Express. Our new home will, thanks in part to RWK Goodman, allow us to train and prepare women of all backgrounds, into restaurant owners, managers and chief executives.

"There is a desperate shortage of women and diversity in senior roles in the hospitality industry and it is poorer for it. I will use our new Covent Garden restaurant to open doors to those who are under-represented in our industry."

Richard Lake, an Associate in the Real Estate team at RWK Goodman who advised Darjeeling Express, said: "Whilst the hospitality industry has been hit hard by coronavirus, it is also creating opportunities for successful, committed and ambitious restaurateurs.

"The hospitality sector - and its customers - need and want chefs like Asma Khan to be successful, to deliver fantastic food and to change the shape of the industry. We are thrilled to have been a part of the Darjeeling Express story."