Chris Lucas, the restaurateur behind Chin Chin in Sydney and Melbourne, will join the Canberra food party when he adds Carlotta to his restaurant stable in spring. The big question is, why have some of Australia’s big food names chosen now to march on the nation’s capital?

Earlier this month, Matt Moran swung open the doors at Italian steakhouse Compa, while Manny Spinola, the veteran Sydney restaurateur behind Lola’s Italian in Bondi and the stalwart Tea Room at QVB, is already feeding hungry Canberrans at The Marion, on the edge of Lake Burley Griffin.

Lucas, who will open the 150-seat Carlotta “in the heart of Canberra” at Scotts Crossing, says he’s long toyed with the ACT market, and came close to doing an earlier deal, which was derailed by the pandemic.

The city has competitive advantages that have budding operators licking their lips. Lucas points to its younger demographics, “the highest disposable income in Australia” and a lower saturation of restaurants to population compared with Sydney or Melbourne.

“It’s a city that takes food seriously, it has a great food culture,” Lucas says. There are great producers at its doorstep that Lucas intends to tap. And Canberra has already put itself on the food map without any outside help, with Such and Such restaurant pipping more fancied Sydney rivals to be named SMH Good Food Guide’s 2024 New Restaurant of the Year.

“It felt like the stars were aligning for Canberra,” Lucas says. He skipped the obvious route of opening one of his existing brands, but hasn’t ruled out a future play: “I’d love to have a Chin Chin here, but at the moment, all our energy is focused on Carlotta.”

“I wanted to do something just for Canberra. It is its own city with its own culture,” he adds.

Carlotta will take in a broad sweep of the Mediterranean, and while the name hints at an Italian skew “there’ll be a bit of Spain, a bit of Greece, a custom wood oven is being built in Italy, the dining room will take design cues from mid-20th-century Italian.”

Lucas says the clincher for the deal was the involvement of QIC, the investment company he previously collaborated with on the 80 Collins Street precinct in Melbourne, where Lucas opened the high-end Society restaurant, Lillian Brasserie, and “high-octane” Yakimono in 2021.

“We have a shared vision on how food – with world-class restaurants and bars – can transform a precinct,” Lucas says.