Sabine — Restaurant in London

If you’re a pretty normal person this bar is NOT FOR YOU. Be prepared to be ignored and feel like a hinderance to the staff and read the below if you don’t believe me....

Firstly, this is the first negative review I have EVER (and I mean ever) wrote and I do not enjoy doing it. I hope the bars owners, staff and neighbouring hotel read and take notice..

Myself and my partner had already endured some very poor service at the Leonardos hotel bar downstairs due to some selected staff members (the hotel where we had been staying the last few nights) and when I spoke to the hotel night concierge he kindly agreed to open our mini bar and recommended the rooftop bar upstairs to myself and my girlfriend. We had tried the night before and it was very busy, which is understandable as the setting was great and it was a Friday night!

We arrived tonight and the bar was empty and we were seated to very quickly inside by a very kind member of front of house staff; the seats were amazing and it was a quick rest bite from the mess downstairs. There were plenty of staff on and there were only 5-6 seats actually taken, we were seated in the corner with a beautiful view of St Paul’s which was perfect,

2 or 3 other tables arrived of slightly larger parties but no more than four or five. These were seen to pretty quickly and were looked after by a new member of staff named “Michael” who seemed very attentive and considered who did not seat ourselves. My self and partner waited and assumed we would be seen to soon as there was so many staff on, but we were waiting a while. We were not greeted again by another member of staff but all other tables seemed to be getting ‘looked after’ but not ourselves. On the back of our awful service thanks to Leonardos it felt like a slap in the face when we were recommended this place by the hotel management downstairs half an hour earlier,

We continued to wait but we did not prompt any members of staff as no other tables did. Their tables had a very personable service which we looked forward to receiving but never seemed to come. We gave the one staff member (Michael) the benefit of the doubt but the wait got silly as other tables received multiple cocktails and were we left out of just a beer (which is all I wanted!!)

We waited more than 25 MINUTES with less than 6 tables in the whole place which were actually seated with over 7 members of staff who were all visibly dancing and singing (in full view of us !) behind the bar without a care! It honestly felt like we were forgotten in the corner as we are a pretty normal, unassuming 20-something couple who are not much fuss looking for a casual drink after a long day.

We had gave the staff the benefit of the doubt but I’d simply had a enough and walked out which the blonde front of house member didn’t seem to really care about, apart from Michael who acknowledged my partner and seemed pretty shocked and let down by his team.

The 6-7 young female staff members behind the bar simply laughed after we went and carried on singing and dancing which really upset me. They didn’t make an effort when I was in the bar and most certainly did not care I was leaving

From a professional point of view it seriously lacked some leadership and responsibility whilst leaving quite a sour taste in our mouths; I’m not sure if it was the way I was dressed (as I was in shorts) or the fact that it was late and most members of staff wanted to clock out rather than serve us, but we both left feeling quite small and pathetic,

I would not wish this upon anybody and hope the relevant management act on this feedback. I really hope other people think twice about booking this bar (and also the hotel) as they seem to have dropped service standards so low even walking out doesn’t seem to turn a head

A bad end to what...

1 Star – Only Because I Can’t Give Zero I truly wish I had read the reviews before stepping foot into this place. I visited yesterday with guests from abroad who were excited to see it because they saw it trending on TikTok. They were captivated by the view, and to be fair, the view is breathtaking — a solid 10/10. But that's where the compliments end. Everything else about this place was an utter disaster, and frankly, a complete embarrassment — especially when you're hosting people from out of the country. The service was non-existent. My guest arrived 15–20 minutes before me, and when I joined her, I asked why she hadn't ordered a drink yet. She told me she'd been trying to get a server’s attention the entire time, but no one even looked her way. Eventually, I had to call someone over. The waitress came by and apologized, claiming they were “overwhelmed” — yet the venue was not even remotely busy. I counted at least 3–4 floor staff meandering around. The excuse was laughable. We were given water and told she'd come back to take our drink orders — another 20 minutes passed before that happened. Then once we finally got our drinks (which took another 20 minutes), we were ready to order food. I requested a glass of prosecco to arrive with my meal. Guess what? The food came — no prosecco.I gave it the benefit of the doubt, thinking maybe it was just delayed. But we finished our food, and still no prosecco . I’ve been gone up to the front desk and asked to be speak to the manager at which point they asked what was the issue I explained I hadn’t received my drink the waitress came over she said your drink is at your table. I said my drink is not there, I had just come from the table.The bar said the drink has just been sitting there. She hasn’t come to collect it. She has then tried to hand me the drink while I’m standing at the front desk, mind blowing. At this point, I was already over it. And to make things worse, our dirty plates and empty glasses were left sitting on the table for at least 15 minutes after we were done eating. I asked to speak with a manager. The first request — nothing. Second time — still nothing. It wasn’t until the third time, when I physically went to the front to demand someone, that the manager finally came out. And just as I was calmly speaking to him, a waitress (yes, the same one) rudely interrupted to say she was “I upset because she said she could charge my phone,’which, first of all, had nothing to do with our conversation, and secondly, is wildly inappropriate for her to butt into a private discussion with management. Mind you — this was happening at the front door, with other guests walking in and witnessing this madness. It was mortifying. To the manager’s credit, he did attempt to calm the situation and admitted the waitress was completely out of line. He apologized and acknowledged that her behavior was unacceptable. But by then, the damage was done. What’s worse? After reading through recent reviews, it’s clear this isn't an isolated incident. People have been complaining about the same service issues for months, and nothing has changed. It’s obvious they’re relying solely on the view to draw people in and clearly, that strategy is working for now. But this is not a restaurant you go to for quality, experience, or hospitality. Oh and let’s not forget the mandatory minimum spend. To be forced to spend a certain amount in a place with such abysmal service and subpar food is an insult. You’re essentially paying for the view — and nothing else. If you care about good food, attentive service, and a proper experience — do yourself a favor and go literally anywhere else in London. There are dozens of rooftops with decent views and much better everything else. This place is all...

We visited Sabine on a pretty quiet afternoon, we were so excited to try the rooftop bar! However we were left feeling really deflated by the experience, and to be honest it put a dampener on our stay at the hotel.

Upon entering the bar, their wasn’t any staff to greet us or a sign saying “wait to be seated”, so we continued to walk up the entrance to the outside area, assuming we didn’t need to wait to be seated. A member of staff then walked over to us and pretty much walked us all the way back to the entrance which was a really odd exchange… we were told that we couldn’t sit outside as these seats were reserved for people who had pre booked - which we thought was fair enough, but there did seem to be a large amount of available tables on the outside terrace… but we thought no more of it.

After being seated inside, we waited about 20 minutes before someone came to ask us if we would like to order a drink. In this time we had heard another server greet two people and ask them if they would like to be seated on the outside terrace! These people had not pre booked and were automatically offered this option? So when we were finally asked if we’d like to order, I asked the server if we could move to outside and they found a table for us.

I found it really odd how the person who greeted us would deny us terrace seating, it made me feel really uncomfortable the entire time we were there, and I kept trying to figure out why we were treated so poorly upon arrival.

The terrible service didn’t stop there, not once were we asked if we would like to order another drink. It was a beautiful day and I was fully prepared to spend the afternoon enjoying the views, the stunning weather and the impressive menu. However after realising that the copious amount of staff were incapable of delivering a level of customer service to match their price point, we decided to pay for our drinks and go elsewhere, or so we thought… 😂

Nobody came to give us the bill after we’d asked for it. 40 minutes went by and still no bill, so we headed to the bar to make their job easier and hopefully pay there. We were told to take a seat back at our table and they would be over in a second. So we happily sat back down and waited, and waited… another 25 minutes later and still no bill. In the end we had to approach another waitress again and process the payment before she could scuttle away.

I am not someone who tends to complain or to even remove a service charge, but our experience at Sabine definitely wasn’t worthy of a positive review as the absolute bare minimum level of customer service was simply not exchanged. In all my years of working and visiting here, I honestly feel that “post covid London” has instilled an incredibly lazy work ethic, where people lack the fundamental skills to do their job well when working in the hospitality and retail sector, and have an incredibly poor attitude.

In this industry you will almost certainly encounter some pretty rude customers, I’ve been there and those experiences are awful, which is why I always make a conscious effort to be polite and respectful to anyone who is working in hospitality, it’s not a big ask to match my energy and reserve your poor service for the customers who are rude and entitled - it’s not hard to differentiate between the two.

To add to this, we actually pre booked outside seating for the evening but after our experience in the daytime, we decided to cancel our booking and not return. I’m sorry to say this but we were gutted, and wouldn’t not recommend Sabine to anyone visiting the area. I believe you can get a nice rooftop view of the area from the shopping centre...