PYRÁ — Restaurant in London

We held our wedding reception at Pyra. We booked the entire venue, with the upstairs loft serving as a dance floor with bar and downstairs having tables and seating for guests.  Canapes were served upstairs and a buffet dinner was served downstairs.  We lucked out with great April weather, so guests were also able to enjoy Pyra’s patio and additional space on Lonsdale Road.  Overall we were very happy with our decision to have our reception at Pyra, and many of our guests commented on how lovely the space was, how nice the staff were, and how delicious the food was.

The venue: 
The space is gorgeous with lots of natural light upstairs.  Guests arrived at 4pm but we had the venue for the entire day, and Pyra gave our florist access earlier to set up beautiful flower arrangements and candles - it looked stunning.  Pyra set up our welcome sign and card box too. The venue also accepted delivery of our cake on the morning of the wedding which was a huge help, set it up very nicely upstairs, and cut it for us after the formal “cake cutting” shots.  We were able to coordinate with Pyra ahead of time to arrange the space how we wanted, such as how many tables we wanted downstairs and the set-up of the loft upstairs.  They even had a microphone ready for us upstairs so we could say a few words to our guests before our cake cutting. Perfect! For the evening dancing, we were able to set the disco lighting to our colour scheme, which worked really well with candles and foliage (latter 2 provided by our florist).

The food:
 The buffet dinner was fantastic.  Pyra gave us multiple menu items to choose from and we were able to fix a nice menu that took into account guests’ dietary restrictions.  We initially booked the venue when it had a different chef and menu.  We came in a few months before our wedding to try the new menu – our dinner was delicious then and there was no dip in quality for the buffet-style served at our reception. Fionn worked with us how to plan best - because we wanted a relaxed style with a dance floor upstairs, we ended up feeding our 80 guests in two sittings downstairs, which worked perfectly. The upstairs space can seat 60 people, which didn’t work for how we planned our event, but does look really nice in photos. The late night food served around 10pm also went down very well.

The staff:
 The staff, including the bartenders and waiters, were hardworking, friendly and very nice to guests.  Enough staff were around that guests never had to wait long for drinks.  Members of staff cut our cake for us and also boxed up the late night food for guests to bring home.  Fionn, the day-of coordinator, was on-site for our entire reception and was very helpful, even helping coordinate our midnight bus arrival.

Responsiveness: Overall we were happy with the responsiveness of the venue.  It took a little while to nail down the final details of the food menu and drinks menu/bar tab but we were ultimately very happy with the result.  As the venue hosts more weddings/ larger-scale events we’d expect this will improve.

Overall:
 We highly recommend Pyra for a wedding reception. We had 80 guests in total, which worked very well for the canapes/cocktail hour upstairs (4-6pm), sit-down buffet downstairs (6-8pm, split into two seatings) and dancing upstairs (8pm-midnight).  The upstairs loft was able to fit all 80 guests plus a four-piece band.  Lonsdale Road is also a charming street that provided great photo opportunities.  We looked into several other venues, and came away happy with the cost at Pyra as well – we were able to book the venue, food (including canapes, dinner and late night food) and a generous bar tab for roughly the amount some other London venues were charging for just their space (no food or drink included). We and our guests had a fantastic time. Thanks so much to Fionn and the...

Service from hell. Wow, how could a restaurant be this shockingly bad at service and atmosphere? My young son and I arrived for lunch on a Saturday at 1220pm and waited to be seated for 15 minutes. Restaurant was nearly empty. Bar and kitchen staff saw us but we were ignored. Finally I asked the woman behind the bar if we could sit down and she said "sit anywhere", so we sat outside. When we asked to see the menu they said it wasn't ready yet and it was being printed. No matter, I thought, I'll read the one posted on the door. They told me that was out of date and not to read it. We waited for half an hour for a menu. When the menus finally arrived, the group of women at the table next to us joked, "They had to grow the tree first before chopping it down to make paper". Then we ordered. Other tables were given bread and tomatoes on the house but we weren't for whatever reason, despite arriving before some of them. Then one of our starters was given to another table where it sat for ages before I finally walked over to retrieve it (by then it was cold). The waiter blamed the kitchen for this mess up. Then our food came and it looked different from the same dish at the table next to us (ours was missing the garnishes). When I asked the waiter about this, he said "Oh, yes, yours is a different garnish." We were never apologised to for any of this behaviour. Instead, the staff acted as if the customers were irritating them -- perhaps we were, but then maybe don't work in the service industry. They treated us with farcical levels of rudeness and disdain. The food itself is delicious but that alone will not save this place! I will avoid and tell everyone in QP...

The food and atmosphere was good but the service was a bit of a mess as the first impression. We waited more than 40mins for our food and not even a milk bread to start with. When we sat down, they just left us there, no water or attention for like 10 minutes. I saw a waiter and wave at him but he just looked at me and ignored me although I can tell that he manages drinks only. Still, he could be polite and signal me he would ask his colleague to come take our food order. That's quite rude. Overall it's a pity as the food is good but the servicing management requires big improvements and they need more staffs. The Gemini generated summary saying efficient staffs are inaccurate and I think for now it's 4.2 rating than 4.6. The feta wrap, octopus skewers and milk bread were good but the chorizo and fries were normal which you could avoid. The portions are big so when they tell you you need 4 to 5 as a couple, NO. 3 to 4 plates are more than enough. We were so stuffed and have to waste half of the milk bread and fries. Wasting food is not our style. Make sure you look around to see the portions...