Melissa Hoyer
After the best part of three decades charming the world from other people’s kitchens – London, LA and wherever the cameras and kitchens took him – Curtis Stone is coming home.
The Melbourne-born chef has just been confirmed to lead the culinary program at Waldorf Astoria Sydney, marking two firsts in one announcement: his debut restaurant on Australian soil, and the Waldorf Astoria brand’s first hotel in this country.
It’s a neat piece of symmetry. Stone left Australia to build a global name for himself; now that name is being used to anchor one of the most storied hospitality brands on earth, right back where he started. He’ll oversee two original dining concepts at the hotel, set to open in 2027 at One Circular Quay, arguably the single best address in the country to put a restaurant, harbour views included at no extra charge.
Stone has described the project as personal, drawing on the producers and hospitality culture he grew up with rather than importing a formula that worked somewhere else.
Given his track record, that’s worth taking at face value as this isn’t a chef lending his name to a menu he’ll never see again.
The Waldorf Astoria connection matters too. This is a brand with Michelin-starred partnerships with Heinz Beck in Rome; Gordon Ramsay in Versailles; Clare Smyth and Daniel Boulud in London; Dave Pynt heading to Bali.
With Sydney joining the list the Curtis inclusion and culinary creativity is a statement about how seriously the brand is taking its first Australian outpost, rather than simply parachuting in.
For a city that’s had more than its share of hyped restaurant launches this one has the ingredients to be different: a genuinely significant site, a chef with nothing left to prove and everything to gain from getting it right at home, and eighteen months to actually build something rather than rush it.
Worth watching and the wait.
Waldorf Astoria Sydney’s Curtis Stone restaurants are slated to open in 2027.
