Rules, London's Oldest Restaurant, Is Protected for Good After Its Owner Gave the Building to the National Trust
J-P Mayhew has gifted the Covent Garden home of Rules to the National Trust in a donation worth £11 million, and the restaurant keeps serving as a tenant.
Photo: htcgezerr / Pexels
If you have ever ordered treacle sponge at Rules, you have eaten in a building that now belongs to the National Trust. J-P Mayhew, who has owned 34-35 Maiden Lane in Covent Garden for four decades, has donated it to Europe's biggest conservation charity in a gift valued at £11 million.
The restaurant itself is going nowhere. Ricky McMenemy, the proprietor who has worked at Rules for 35 years, becomes a commercial tenant of the Trust, and the rent from the restaurant business will pay for conservation work every year.
An oyster bar that outlasted an empire and the Blitz
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