HOPE Street is the place that just keeps on giving this week.
First there was the news of the Everyman's rise from the ashes of demolition with an opening date and a programme. Then there was news of the new Bistro, which is being managed by Thomas Lang.
'The old carbon pencils have gone. This is a
blank canvas and a new set of colouring tools'
But here's the one Liverpool Confidential has been told to keep shtum about all summer.
Paddy Byrne and the team who brought you Liverpool's wonderful Everyman Bistro from 1970 to 2011, are back.
They will be opening Sustenance - a working title - in the basement of the Annexe, the building directly next to The Everyman Theatre, sometime next year.
"New name, new location, new menu, same ethos," they say.
Unlike The Cavern and Mathew St, this will be no attempt at a replica. There are windows and a back garden for a start.
Since the closure of the Bistro in July 2011, there have been plenty of dispossessed people kicking around pubs and cafes in town who saw the place as the Mothership. A new HQ was desperately sought.
Paddy ByrneHowever, Paddy who ran the multi-award-winning Ev, with brother Tim and Dave Scott, sought something else, something new.
Tom Gilll, head chef, had gone off to The Brink, other Bistro chefs set up in Blackburne House and The Fly In the Loaf, a cake-making company was founded by Claudia and Pam - and with Paddy lending his expertise to venues like Rubato, in the basement of the Philharmonic Hall, it was possible to feel the legacy of the late lamented Ev in venues all over town.
After the news broke this week of Tom Lang's appointment as F&B director of the NEW Everyman bars and bistro, which will be operated by a catering company called Baxter Storey, a spokesman for the OLD Bistro commented: "It's a terrific appointment and we would like to wish Tom and his new team all the best for when they open.
"With the re-opening of the Everyman now in sight, it is important that we set some distance between what was and what will be.
"Since the curtain came down on 41 years of trade in the cellars of the old Hope Hall, there have been no shortage of rumours as to what the team behind the Bistro MKI would get up to next.
Annex Hope St
"A wine bar for recovering mechanics? WRONG. Mexican street food cooked mostly on a 14 inch waffle iron and served in a fez? WRONG. A van selling inside out butties on West Kirby beach? WRONG."
Sustenance (will it be called Sus for short?) will occupy a similar area space to the Bistro, but this time with SUNSHINE, in the shape of a courtyard, at the back, on Arrad Street, a bit like that of the neighbouring Clove Hitch.
Paddy told Confidential: "This is a new journey. It's great to finally have a project, and the right project, on the go.
"The old carbon pencils have gone. This is a blank canvas and a new set of colouring tools."
Work on Sustenance will commence in March when Everyman Theatre office staff move out of the lower ground floor space at no 13 and into their new building.
As Paddy, Tim,, Dave and Nick Stanley own the Annexe already, Sustenance will, in theory, be as safe as houses.
The clan will be on site from spring, with plans to open in September 2014.
It's been a cold couple of years up the north end of Hope Street.
