Terry Wogan's Sons to Open Pizza Restaurant at Television Centre
Homeslice Pizza to launch in Wood Lane by the end of 2017
Terry Wogan's sons, Terry and Alan are opening a Homeslice Pizza restaurant in Television Centre in Wood Lane.
It will join other restaurants launching at the redeveloped centre, including a new branch of Made in Chelsea favourite Bluebird and Mediterranean tapas bar Salt Yard before the end of the year.
The brothers have already launched three branches of Homeslice Pizza in Covent Garden, Fitzrovia and Shoreditch after beginning life in 2011 with a mobile wood-fired oven hand built by partner Ry Jessup.
They say: " With a shared vision of retaining Homeslice’s original simplicity, the aim was to balance tradition with innovation, offering people our take on the classics alongside more unique flavour combinations. The result was a simple menu of pizza, beer and wine with quality, seasonal produce at its heart, served in a relaxed, friendly space."
In an interview with the Evening Standard in 2016, the brothers said that as children, they often went to BBC Television Centre to watch their father, who died of cancer in January last year, record shows like Blankety Blank and Children in Need specials.
Alan told the Standard: "I can remember being driven through those gates to the ‘doughnut’ building with Dad as kids — we’ve got emotional ties with the place. This brings things full circle.
"It’s quite amazing to think that we will be going to have a restaurant right next to it. Obviously ours is a very different business from the one that Dad was in and we are very proud of Dad’s achievements there."
He added: "It would have been nice if he’d known we were going to open a restaurant where he spent so much of his career. He would have been thrilled. He was very proud of what he had seen of us doing with the business."
The redevelopment of Television Centre will provide 950 new homes – with 432 in the first phase - plus office space, a new Soho House club and hotel and Electric Cinema as well as a variety of restaurants and cafes.
The BBC will return to three refurbished studios in September 2017 and BBC Worldwide completed their move to the site in March 2015, with over 1,200 people in their new headquarters on Wood Lane.