For centuries, coach hotels have been a key part of British society. They offer a breather for those traveling around the country in horse and carriages, and tired travelers who provide food and drinks. The 17th-century country architecture that now has a Michelin-starred restaurant OSIP was once one of them.
The property is located on one of the main roads that were once between London. “People will stop, stay overnight, have a meal, have a beer, and go on,” chef and owner Merlin Labron-Johnson told Observer. He wanted to continue the historic legacy, and in June he made his four-bedroom debut above OSIP. “This is the inspiration for what we are doing right now. The idea is that people will spend the night at OSIP, have a good breakfast, and they will keep going. Coach Inns isn’t really giving you a meal and it feels like we’re continuing that tradition in the tasting menu.”
Labron-Johnson first opened OSIP in a smaller space in Bruton in 2019. He has led two restaurants in London (Michelin-star Portland and its sister restaurant Clipstone), but wants to move to a quieter place where he can grow his own products. “I have this vision to move to the countryside and open a restaurant,” he said. “It’s important for me to work in an agricultural area. I wanted to find a farm or farmer that could be grown specifically for me.”
Bruton, a picturesque town in Somerset, not far from Bristol, seems to be the right place. It is an upscale area with several celebrity residents, including actor Aaron Taylor-Johnson, fashion designer Alice and filmmaker Joe Wright, as well as a vast art gallery post Hauser & Wirth. It is known for its apples and ciders as well as dairy products, including its beloved cheese makers Westcombe Dairy. However, Somerset is not known for its vegetables, and Labron-Johnson initially struggled to find farmers who could work with.
“It’s hard to find a consistent supply of truly beautiful, organic produce,” the chef said. “I realized I wouldn’t find the person I thought.” Fortunately, a friend at the restaurant offered to lend him a piece of land. “It suddenly happened to me, ‘What if I did it myself?'” he said
At that time, Labron-Johnson had no experience in agriculture. He grew up in Devon, where his mom ate a lot of vegetables there, and he appreciated the sustainable products he worked in In de Wulf at chef Kif okobe Desramaults, a now-paved Belgian restaurant. “I know something about some aspects of it,” he said when we visited one of two farms near OSIP called Dreamers in early July. “But I have to learn by myself. I spent six months watching YouTube videos and reading.” He was also able to “harness local knowledge” with the help of another friend of OSIP.
Dreamers is five minutes away from the road to OSIP. It is relatively small, but Labron-Johnson estimates that more than 100 different ingredients are grown between his two farms (the other is called Coombe). This tunnel provides more and more tunnels for warm-weather plants, such as tomatoes and a row of beds, for herbs and vegetables. OSIP now has its own growers to maintain the garden, but Labron-Johnson also encourages his staff to participate in the process. The garden offers OSIP and its more casual sister restaurants and bars Old pharmacyalso located in Bruton. Any surplus is sold to other nearby restaurants, including Margot Henderson’s Three horseshoe batsor give to those in need.
“From May to December, we were self-sufficient and we overproduced,” Labron-Johnson said. “We just donated a bunch of vegetables to a local food library. But from January to April, we call it the ‘hunger difference’, which is much harder. I’m working on making that gap smaller. Tasting menus is a great way not to waste food. We do 250 people a week, we each have the same thing, and in the old pharmacy we could make a blackboard and if we could do any blackboard, we could do any preparation.
Later that night, many of the ingredients in the garden we visited appeared on my table as part of the tasting menu, which was the only way to eat in the restaurant (95 for lunch and 125 for dinner). The meal begins with a plate of rough carrots, small gem lettuce and crispy radish. Broad beans and monk’s beards appear on monk’s dishes, and yellow zucchini appear in the elegant rolls of summer vegetables in focus. Menu evolves rather than sudden changes, Osip’s kitchen sticks to their perfect dishes year after year.
“In the summer, things quickly change because there are almost a lot of different things that are hard to keep up,” he said. “It can be overwhelming because you want to work with everything. And we’re not even in the peak season of this year.”
Building a first-hand connection with agricultural products has completely changed the way chefs cooks and approach food. He emphasizes protein on vegetables, although scallops, ducks and monks appear on the menu at present. The idea is to make sure that each vegetable tastes like its best version. “It’s very hard work to harvest them,” Labron-Johnson said. “So, in order to be able to provide them with fresh service, you want to show them with minimal manipulation. Our cooking style becomes more natural and simple.”
Last fall, Labron-Johnson relocated Osip, who won the Michelin Star in 2021 and Michelin Green Star in 2023 from the original space in the center of Bruton. He renovated the lounge and dining room and added two kitchens, one overlooking the table and surrounded by floor-to-ceiling windows. Upstairs, the existing seven bedrooms are converted into four larger rooms, two of which are duplex. OSIP was first reopened as a restaurant, and Labron-Johnson spent the entire room this year, which officially debuted in mid-June and started at £300 a night.
“The space starts to feel like a house, and that’s what I meant,” he said. “Four rooms feel comfortable. It doesn’t feel like a hotel, so if you go to a hotel, like room service, people don’t have that kind of expectation. Everyone can have breakfast together in the morning.”
Named after the Somerset River, these rooms were designed by Johnny Smith and feature a natural pastoral palette and aesthetic. The headboard and headboard table were made of local oak and the team made leather strap bags for the keys in Bill Amberg Studio. OSIP works with Harvest to produce its own toiletries, OSIP’s Maison series, and guests hold a bottle of cider from the restaurant when they arrive. Breakfast included, which was my highlight overnight, which included bees from Osip, homemade granola and sliced honey from Westcombe Cheddar.
Labron-Johnson wants guests to feel immersed in Somerset’s landscape, which can be seen in many windows throughout the building and in the crafts of the area. “We wanted to include a lot of small details in the space,” he said. “We worked with some great artists, so there is a story behind everything. OSIP is really a celebration of craftsmanship, art and design, and food. It should be a holistic experience.”
Although OSIP is the culmination of Labron-Johnson’s vision, the chef still believes it is an ongoing work. The outdoor space behind the restaurant is under development – he recently added wildflower and terrace seating, and when the weather is clear, OSIP has started serving pre-dinner drinks outside. He may add more rooms at some point.
“I think this is the beginning of the journey,” Labron-Johnson said. “I’ve invested a lot of time and I need to make it work now and it’s going to take a long time to do that. This restaurant is definitely my flagship store. But at the same time, I can take a look at it and realize it can take five to ten years to bring it to where I want it. I think it’s a great place to start.”
For now, OSIP is a private destination, rural enough to feel remote, but less than two hours from London’s train. Countryside manor in Soho House Babington House Nearby, Luxury spa hotel Newt, Somerset. There are country walks, national trust website Stodd And, of course, there is Stonehenge, which is very short from the hotel. By leveraging local history and agricultural culture, OSIP has become an integral part of some of Somerset’s large number of products.
