The Ivy Bath Brasserie & Garden — Restaurant in Bath

Regretfully having to leave a negative review, I reached out to the restaurant directly but have not had a response.

In short our bookings made weeks in advance were not honoured, my family was split up, service and some of our food was overcooked and poor.

A really negative experience all round and represented poor value especially with the abundance of other excellent restaurants in Bath.

Full text of my direct feedback to the manager below, I hope this is useful to other potential customers even if the management have not responded.

Dear Restaurant Management, I hope this message finds you well. I am writing to express my concerns regarding the service my family and I received at your restaurant on May 12th. Both my sister-in-law, Sarah, and I made pre-theatre bookings for 4 people each at 5 pm, requesting outdoor seating on the terrace. Upon our arrival, we were informed by the host that only one booking was made for the terrace and that if we wished to sit together, we would need to be accommodated downstairs inside. Despite our immediate questioning of this arrangement, the host was insistent, and we reluctantly assumed it was our error. However, after reviewing our bookings, we have confirmed that both reservations were indeed made for the terrace. Additionally, we had requested to be seated next to each other, if possible, well in advance. During our meal, my sister asked our waiter to verify this, and he later confirmed there had been a misunderstanding. The host had decided that seating us downstairs was preferable. I am particularly concerned that the host would misrepresent the situation to us, especially considering we had elderly parents and a young child with us, making it unlikely for us to cause a scene. This has led me to believe that the terrace may have been fully occupied, and rather than addressing this honestly, the host chose to mislead us. While I understand that logistical challenges can arise, I would have appreciated transparency, allowing us to make an informed decision about our seating arrangements. We have dined at several Ivy establishments and generally had positive experiences, which makes this situation all the more disappointing. Beyond the seating issue, we also encountered other service and food-related problems that detracted from our overall enjoyment. Given these circumstances, I am finding it difficult to justify the service charge we paid for both meals, as the level of service did not meet our expectations. I would appreciate your thoughts on this matter and an explanation of how the restaurant intends to address such issues in the future. Furthermore, I would like to understand why my family and friends should continue to choose the Ivy for our dining experiences. Thank you for your attention to this matter. I look forward to your response. Kind...

What a terrible experience at the Ivy Bath. It went wrong from the moment myself and my family stepped though the door we were running late but actually that didn’t matter as are table wasn’t ready when we arrived anyway. I explained to the lady on the door that i had brought some pasta for my daughter to eat because she has an eating disorder and struggles to eat out she responded ok thats fine. We were then asked to take a seat at the bar while we waited for our table this wasn’t ideal as my daughter is only 9 but we sat there all the same and ordered some drinks. While sat at the bar one of the waiters couldn’t reach a bottle of wine from the top shelf so he climbed on to the mat that is used to cut the fruit for the drinks with his dirty shoes on. The manager then came over to myself and my family and said that my 9 year old daughter could not eat her pasta in the restaurant because of food contamination. Now i am trying to work out what is more contaminating my daughter eating pasta or the member of staff standing on the counter where the fruits are cut. In response to this i just said fine and we were shown to our table. We asked to order straight away mainly because my daughter couldn’t eat are order was taken and we explained that the last time we had visited the restaurant most of our food had arrived cold so please could they make sure this didn't happen again. My partner ordered a burger and asked for cheese i had the shepherds pie with Broccoli. My partner also asked for another drink. when the food arrived about 15 minutes later the Broccoli was cold there was no cheese in the burger so we had to send the food back which was disappointing as we had said before about our last experience. We asked for sauces these weren’t brought over until most of the meal had been eaten and then there was the drink which turned out to be a no show and it wasn’t until we asked the waitress again about the drink that she said its on its way but by this point my partner had finished his meal so no longer wanted the drink. At the end of the meal the waitress asked us how our food was and i said to be honest it wasn’t the best and explained why and she became quite rude. So overall would i return to this restaurant honestly no do i think it was worth £110 no and i definitely wouldn’t...

Booked the Ivy for my birthday because I wanted something a bit special. I hate to nitpick but there was no one at reception in the foyer for quite a while and when someone did attend we were told the table wasn't ready, I offered to go away and come back as we were 10 minutes early but the girl went to check if there was seating at the bar which thankfully there was. We were taken to our table 30 minutes late, which was fine because we were enjoying a drink before dinner. The table was a corner seat and was very small and also very close to other diners which kind of made me feel like the other diners had to budge up to make room for me to get into my seat so I had to force my rear end past the table to be seated! There was no way I was going to get up again for the loo!! It was not comfortable and I felt like I was encroaching on the privacy of others as well as being encroached upon! It was like being an after thought and having to make do! Conversations were not private.

We ordered olives and sourdough bread while we waited and a bottle of wine. The bread was a whole loaf and was delicious but a lot for two even though we were sharing! The wine was awful and I couldn't drink more than a glass, it was £32 so their most basic but I didn't expect it to be so bad! I ordered fish and chips and my husband ordered the shepherd pie. It took a long time to arrive. When the food came we were both surprised... My plate had very ample portions with a big piece of fish and equally large pot of mushy peas and a big bucket of chips however my husband got a tiny portion of shepherds pie! I felt so bad about it I gave him my chips, we were both very grateful for the bread now!! It was shocking!! It was no bigger than my fist litterally!

I've never been to the ivy before and I'm not in a rush to go back. My food was OK, nothing special but my husband did enjoy the pie, he just wandered where the rest of it was!

I have to say it was very bad value for money and I felt ripped off, awful experience not to be repeated! I've had better value for money at my local Ember Inn!

Staff were friendly but felt forgotten maybe because there were just two of us.

Our bill was £134 which included a £15 service...