Wiltons is the best neighbor anybody could have. The beloved, historic restaurant is next to New & Lingwood on Jermyn Street. It’s a destination for the great and the good who appreciate the superb oysters and Dover sole (though others time their visits around what’s offered on the carving trolley). Wiltons is reassuring like a well-run and welcoming club. This doesn’t happen by accident, so we sat down with Wiltons director, Jason Phillips, to find out how they became a London establishment.

David Coggins: Can we talk about Wiltons history?

Jason Phillips: Wiltons started off as an oyster barrow. It would have been a wheelbarrow and they would have sold oysters to the poor of Saint James's End. Around the Haymarket because the oysters were plentiful, they were cheap there. George William Wilton would have parked his oyster Barrow outside a pub and would have shucked his oysters to the guests that were going to the pub to drink their beer.

 David Coggins: That’s great. 

Jason Phillips: That carried on for quite a while and it wasn't until 1805 that the family decided to take a permanent shop in Ryder St, which is in Saint James's. So it was around the corner. There was a market selling hay to the shepherds to feed the sheep. They're not just names of places they actually relate to what was happening at the time.

David Coggins: I love that. 

Jason Phillips: It evolved from being an oyster Barrow into what we'd have called oyster rooms. And these rooms would have been really basic, with sawdust on the floor and wooden tables. There would have been a counter at the end. They would have been shucking the oysters and eventually they got fish tanks and they would have expanded what they were offering. It started gaining a reputation, and by 1840, Wiltons actually had a strong reputation and had 6 royal warrants to various kings and Queens from 1836 through to 1936.

 Wilton's is older than Rules. But if you want the definition of a restaurant which is the liquor licence, and Rules had that first so when everybody says, which is the oldest restaurant in London, we defer to them.

David Coggins: How did things evolve from there? 

Jason Phillips: 1939 to 1944 we're at war with Germany. A bomb went off in Saint James's. And the restaurant was owned by the Wilton family. But by that stage she had actually been handed over to a lady called Bessie Leal. She'd been running the restaurant with her sister for many years.

The bomb went off. She said, This is too much for me. I'm going to move to the countryside where it's safer and she approached Mr. Olaf Hambro, who was a Scandinavian banker. She approached him and she said, Mr. Hambro, Would you help me to sell Wilton's? And he said no. And she said why not? Why wouldn't you want to do that? And he said because we love this restaurant. We don't want anything bad happening to it. We're going to buy it. She said, well, how do you want to proceed? And he said, put it on the end of the bill. So she wrote out a check for one restaurant. I think the amount that suggested was £1200. She got the cheque. He got the key.

David Coggins: Wow.

Jason Phillips: It remained in the Hambro family. It was Olaf that took it over. Then it went to Jocelyn Hambro. Then he passed it on to Richard Hambro and then it went to Jamie Hambro, his brother and Clementine Fraser, Richard's daughter. It’s in the reign where Richard Hambro had it that I started working there, in the early 90s. I worked in there behind the bar in the kitchen initially. Then I came, went to the floor and then I came back and I went behind the bar. So Wiltons has been part of my career since my early 20s. It continues to evolve.

David Coggins: How has it changed since you started?

Jason Phillips: Wiltons had slightly lost its way. I just returned to what it was famous for, which is the quality of the food stand. It's unfussy cooking, it's just the dish cooked exquisitely and represented with all its flavours intact. Coming through the restaurant as you walk in, you arrive, you've got the oyster bar there. Lots of guests come in specifically to have a plate of oysters, some smoked salmon, a glass of champagne and chat to Filippo, who's the oysterman. There are all these rich traditions of the way we serve and look after the guests. Wiltons doesn't chase fads, it unreservedly and unashamedly proud about what it does. Very much like New & Lingwood. In some roads Jermyn Street has this insistence on quality.

David Coggins: Do you think there’s a kind of reassurance it's so rare these days everything's moving so quickly, that Wiltons is essentially unchanged. 

Jason Phillips:  Absolutely. The only thing that we have evolved over the years and something I still fight to maintain is the dress code.

About 10 years ago, we lost the tie. Then we lost the jacket. Now that caused a lot of furor and a lot of people are very upset. One guest banged his first on the table, saying “I don't expect to eat lunch, we're looking at somebody eating in a cardigan.” Which I thought was hysterical. As far as we're concerned, a gentleman will always wear a jacket. We want to create an environment where while you don't have to wear a jacket, you want to wear a jacket because it's the sort of the environment, you choose to do that. Still no shorts, no open-toed shoes, and no short sleeves.

David Coggins: It’s important to draw the line. Now I’m getting hungry thinking about some oysters and the Dover Sole.

Jason Phillips: Hope to see you soon—we’ll have a booth waiting for you.