What It Takes To Keep Betting on Sydney Dining, With the Bentley Group’s Brent Savage and Nick Hildebrandt

One restaurant would be a serious achievement for many, but it’s never been quite enough for Bentley Group’s Brent Savage and Nick Hildebrandt. Over the past two decades, the restaurateurs have opened half a dozen lauded Sydney venues, starting with Bentley Restaurant and Bar back in 2006. According to Savage, it’s been a “wild ride” led by lofty goals right from the start.

“We were very focused on making a great restaurant and moving the needle a little bit from what was perceived as fine dining,” Savage says of Bentley. “At the time, a lot of restaurants were very serious at the really high end fine dining, and we wanted to change the perception of what fine dining could be.” 

Since then, Savage and Hildebrandt have pushed themselves into constant reinvention and expansion, opening spaces like the Chinese- and Japanese-influenced King Clarence, the woodfired Eleven Barrack and, most recently, Southeast Asian-style Ashe and its neighbouring bar Vespertine. The forward motion is a win for Sydney diners, of course, but Hildebrandt says it’s been necessary to succeed in a tough industry.

“It feels like success, but there’s always the challenges of business, and there’s always the pressure to continually get bums on seats. And, as the business gets bigger, the pressure gets bigger,” he says. “Looking back, it’s all good but there’s no room to rest on your laurels.”

The proof of Bentley Group’s success is on show in its latest venture Ashe, which brings the team back together with chef Khanh Nguyen. You could forgive Savage and Hildebrandt for being jaded by the roadblocks of their industry but, when talking about Ashe, both are still as exhilarated as ever.

“We were wanting to do another restaurant with Khanh, who is the head chef at King Clarence, so we started talking about the Southeast Asian concept, and it was a real natural fit and progression, and we became very motivated by it,” Hildebrandt says. “King Clarence obviously is more Chinese and Japanese and Korean, and this was more food from Southeast Asia, Thailand and Vietnam, and so that became the motivation and the concept.”

And while Savage and Hildebrandt can claim plenty of success by now, they’re clear that remaining consistent over decades in hospitality is about the team, collaborators and processes around them.

“Empowering our staff is a very positive thing that we do, which we’ve learned along the way: not to try and do everything ourselves, to use people’s talents and motivate them,” Hildebrandt says. “It’s a two-way street and so I think that’s a very positive thing that we do and it’s very gratifying for everybody.”

Outside partners have been integral across the journey too, whether that’s suppliers, designers or business-focused supporters like Mastercard.

“Mastercard supports our industry as a whole,” says Savage. “Whether it be the recent Dine Out festival, or how they promote and support events in the restaurant industry.”

As for what comes next, the two are unlikely to stop pushing the Bentley Group forward anytime soon.

“We’re very focused on making guest experience a priority and, in the kitchen and on the floor, everyone’s pushing hard to make a really great product because we know there’s a lot of great restaurants around,” says Hildebrandt. “We’re just trying our best to be as good as we can.”

This article is produced by Broadsheet in partnership with Mastercard.