FABLE Melbourne — Restaurant in Melbourne

When searching for venue, I had heard about this place, and being a warm night was keen to book an upmarket rooftop venue for cocktails for a group celebrating a birthday to ensure we got in somewhere. Booking confirmed table was until 12 midnight, which I was happy about to have somewhere booked for the night.

We arrived at 9.45pm and at 10.20pm unexpectedly were told last orders! It was strange that they were calling last orders as the place was still full of customers, and frustrating when you were expecting to make a night out of it and not have to think of where else to go on a Sat night with a bigger group. On the internet it says closes at 3am, so that's quite a few hours difference.

No food was available (we asked the waitress and she went to check and came back to advise), even though it said on the website when booking. We were hoping to order dessert with our cocktails, having decided to forfeit dessert at our dinner venue. I was actually worried that they would expect us to order some food as it mentioned on the booking drinks and small bites.

Some of the cocktails we ordered weren't of a good quality re balanced tastes (too bitter, sweet), and were nearly spilt by the barman when he arrived with the tray.

The waitress and barman who brought the drinks were friendly and trying, but advised that it was both their first day, which showed from their inexperience and knowledge, and made us all think why are so many new here.

The toilets were not clean and hand papers were overflowing from the bin, and one of the staff came in while I was there and said 'oh I've got a bit of work to do!' Not a good look in the bathrooms for a supposedly high quality venue.

When I asked why they were shutting early and if it was due to staffing levels, they said it was due to training new staff, which didn't make sense.

What seemed to be the floor manager/host, when we went to pay the bill, she said they don't split bills, but half our group had already paid individually as they left a bit earlier, so there was a bit of confusion around that. When she came around to our table for the final call to leave, just past 11pm, she said firmly that we are closing in 5 mins as in the lights will be turned off! All the staff were already sitting around the bar enjoying their knock off cocktails / drinks.

Even the little things like not taking us to our table when we arrived, but just pointing to it. And the chairs weren't nicely set up in place. And soon after they called last orders, the waitress was wiping down nearby tables with a bucket and sponge of soap and water. You don't really want to see that when you are trying to have an experience, it was distracting. And given they were shutting so early, they could have done this later on.

The venue itself was lovely (even better IRL, except for the fairy lights which would annoyingly dim intermittently), but the false advertising on the website, and staff/operationally were a let down.

I don't normally write reviews, but felt I needed to this time, as I was so disappointed, especially when arranging a night out for a birthday and taking a risk with a venue that I hadn't tried before, but looked really promising. There were similar comments from the rest of the group.

Service and operationally in general didn't reflect the nice surrounds, which is a shame as could have been an overall high quality experience.

I venture out a few times a week and have worked in hospitality, so appreciate what a basic level of service should be and particular what should be expected at a more upmarket venue.

Definitely need to lift their game professionally. Hopefully improvements can be made, as it has potential. I was so disappointed as this was not the experience that we were expecting...

EDIT: 14/06/25 came here for a second time and again they attempted to double charge us (payment on booking and payment again when receiving the bill.

RIP OFF merchants.

It's sad, everything was great up until the double charge moments. This place has so much potential but they insist on rip off tactics when they don't need to.

I dread to think how many people don't question it and get ripped off.

Note: no response from Fable to the original review.

OP: A really hard place to review. We went as a table of 3 and preordered the chefs selection.

The food was really good and we left full and satisfied.

Drinks selection was good.

The views of the city were fantastic.

One of the downsides of the experience was nearly being charged twice for the chefs selection. When booking online, a prepayment in full is required. When we went to pay for the drinks, at first they tried to charge us for the food again. We had to have the uncomfortable conversation, which escalated to getting a supervisor or manager involved, about this and eventually we weren't charged twice. Unfortunately this put a bit of a downer on the evening. I dread to think how many other people may have been charged twice unknowingly who may not have challenged.

Our booking was delayed 15 minutes and over the phone we were promised a round of complimentary drinks, for the inconvenience , but after the above conversation, we didn't have the energy for a second round of uncomfortable conversation.

When we first arrived the music was nightclub level loud but seemed to get to a more appropriate level as the night went on. Initially we were shouting across the table.

A very mixed experience. The less favourable things like the music and diligent billing can be easily improved therefore I remain optimistic that Fable has the potential to be outstanding. We would try it again one more time before a final judgement and before...

We had a reservation for drinks and dinner and were seated right away, but we never had a waiter come over so had to call over the host after 10 minutes to put in a drink order. Unfortunately the service did not improve after that point.

We ordered the chef's tasting menu and a couple cocktails. The cocktails came out decently quickly and were tasty, but then it was about an hour until the first course came out. The waiter apologised, saying that there was a mixup in the order of courses in the kitchen, but even after that explanation each course took 30 to 45 minutes to arrive. We had four different waiters and hosts come by, but most of the time they were asking if we would like to order any more food, presumably not realising that we were already waiting for the food we ordered 2.5 hours ago, which was frustrating.

To make matters worse, the chef came out to our neighbouring tables to chat with those customers, which of course I thought was a nice gesture, but annoying when it was taking them twice as long to serve us (I think) identical dishes.

The food itself ranged from fine to pretty good. Generally not worth the price and certainly not worth the 3 hours it took to be served.

To the staff's credit, I received a couple apologies throughout but each apology was followed by waiting another 45 minutes for a basic entree. I understand coordination mistakes happen but tonight was clearly a series of misfires.

I normally only ever leave 5 star reviews so I feel terrible writing anything less than positive, but with considering the quality of the food and service in respect to the price, I will not be returning to or recommending...