Restaurant back ‘like a phoenix from ashes’
FARNHAM’S CAFFE PICCOLO RE-OPENS AFTER BLAZE
A RESTAURANT in Farnham has re-opened after a fire damaged the Grade II-listed building last year.
Caffe Piccolo, an Italian restaurant in Farnham, had damage to its kitchen and seating area after a fire that started in the tumble drier took place in November 2020.
Now, the restaurant is to reopen 11 months later after fundraising efforts from the local community helped the business and its owner, Darius Ahmadi, who said he almost stopped because of lockdown pressures and the fire.
Darius was working in Caffe Piccolo in Esher in 1995 but started working at the Farnham branch (now independent) in 2007.
He spoke to the News and Mail about the moment he realised the fire had happened: “It had happened in the middle of the night. It took a few hours until someone realised because by the time the fire got bigger, it was already around four hours, we had CCTV. It recorded the fire at 1.15am and the fire brigade was called at 5am.
“So by the time they came, the damage was quite big, the kitchen completely ruined. We had to build a completely brand new kitchen from scratch.”
The restaurant is a Grade II-listed timbre-framed building and lots of damage was done to the beams.
However, Darius added: “It took longer to refurbish the listed bit than it did to rebuild the kitchen. The kitchen took four months but we did eight months of work [for the listed part]. Because you had to use lime and water, you were not allowed to sand any beams, you had to clean them by hand, so it took a lot. So it’s been a very, very long journey.”
Darius explained that the fire and the Covid-19 pandemic led him to think “enough is enough, I think this is a sign that I have to stop doing what I’m doing”.
Two days after the fire, a friend told Darius that someone had set up a JustGiving page to help fund the restaurant’s repairs.
It turns out the creator of the page was Holly Wilson, who was a regular customer years ago. Darius remembers that she liked the creamy pasta with steak and that she always asked for more wine in the sauce.
Darius said: “I was like, ‘what?!’ You don’t expect this. You don’t expect people to do these things for businesses, you expect them to do it for individuals. But when they do it for a business there’s something in there.”
At first, Darius acknowledged the kind gesture but thought that nothing would come of it. The restaurant was already struggling because of the pandemic as they were restricted to takeaway orders.
Darius also had health issues at the time of the fire. He said: “You’ve already got health issues going on, Covid going on, then everything you’ve got goes up in smoke. You’re like, ‘you know what, what are you doing?’
“I’m 47. So you think, ‘you work all these years to get to an age you can enjoy what you’ve grown’, but then it’s ‘what do you do now?’”
By the end of the fundraising, Darius was shocked to learn that they had raised around £3,500. “It’s like lighting the candle in the darkest place,” he added. “But there were so many people. It was lockdown, people didn’t have money, food or work. But even five or ten quid just made me feel so blessed.
“This place is not just a business, this place is part of community, part of Farnham. That gave me the buzz. This business is worth the fight and I am going to fight for it until the last penny I have.”
At first he thought the repair would be easier, but he didn’t realise that 100 years ago, the side of the kitchen was built without any building regulation. It had no footing and no support for the ceiling.
A couple of months after the fire, Darius realised water from the flood had affected the restaurant’s wood, to the point that floorboards were popping out. He explained that workers would come round to fix the place and suggested that Darius should “just let go and use the money to build another place”. Darius replied that he wanted to stay.
Soon after news of the fire got out, people were offering to come and clean the restaurant, the windows, remove the rubbish and do “anything to help”. This led Darius to phone local tradespeople, some of whom were his local customers, to ask for reduced prices to help him back on his feet. “The prices they gave me and the work they did was unbelievable,” he said.
Darius also got help for the kitchen equipment, which he is paying the company back for when they re-open.
The happiest day for Darius was when the restaurant got lighting for the first time 10 months after the fire. He said: “Not many people get these things sorted. I have been fair to everyone for the last twenty-five years. If someone’s asked me to do a birthday or a Christening for them and they haven’t got enough money, I’d say ‘let me do something for you, let me change the menu’. And I did that.
“Of course this is a business, but at the end of the day I thought ‘I’m here for years, I’m not looking to sell this place and go somewhere else’. I want to have a good image with the locals and when the fire happened, I found out that I had.”
As a thank you, Darius re-opened the restaurant on Sunday, October 10, to all the builders, electricians, plumbers, volunteers and fundraisers who had helped the restaurant come to life again.
All of the restaurant’s staff, except one who has since moved away from Farnham, came back for the re,opening on Monday, October 11.
Darius said: “I always wanted to create a fair way to work. I wanted to give these guys the place I wanted to work. And that paid off.”
Everything has now been refurbished, including an added name to the restaurant. The word for phoenix in Italian, ‘Fenice’ is unofficially added to the restaurant’s name, which Darius said was to explain how the restaurant was like “a phoenix that rose from the ashes”.
This place is not just a business, this place is part of community, part of Farnham. That gave me the buzz.