Inside new 24-seat Brisbane basement restaurant and bar Exhibition

In the basement of the old Metro Arts building in Brisbane’s CBD comes a stylish new underground restaurant where dinner will cost between $150 and $250 per person.

Commissioned graffiti murals line the walls, Japanese cooking instruments from the Edo period fill niches; while pickles, preserves and ferments sit like elegant ornaments across a lit shelf.

Meet Brisbane’s highly anticipated new Exhibition restaurant, where everything – as its name may suggest – is designed to be an artwork.

Interior image of new restaurant, Exhibition, at 109 Edward Street. Picture: Lachie Millard

From former Joy, Fortitude Valley chef and co-founder Tim Scott, the intimate 24-seater in the character-bursting basement of the old Metro Arts building in Brisbane’s CBD is the culmination of two years of dreaming, planning and hard work.

Exhibition will follow a Japanese kaiseki-style format, showcasing the finest produce of the season in a set menu inspired by Asia cookery and techniques from across the world.

Ensuring the produce will be its absolute best, is Scott’s relationship with local farmers.

The chef has teamed up with multiple local growers, including Neighbourhood Farm, Loop Growers and Boon Luck to source the best of the best, even staking plots within farms to harvest his own produce for the restaurant.

Restaurateur Tim Scott at his new dining experience, Exhibition. Picture Lachie Millard

The ingredients will then be served up as a five-course degustation, though this could be up to 25 plates of food with matching sides and snacks.

“Each course will come with one plate for each person and then to accompany that we’ll have like sauces and pickles and other versions of the same sort of dish, like we’ll have cooked abalone and then we’ll use the livers in another sort of snack, and our beef will have a tartare and then a grilled version,” Scott said.

The feast will cost $150 per person, with the option to choose a premium package for $250, featuring luxury extras and upgrades such as Sturgeon caviar and Tasmanian lobster.

“Some people will want to go out and have some luxury items, so we want to provide that because that’s what our goal is to exhibit those things,” Scott said.

Guests will also be able to choose from a matching alcoholic or non-alcoholic beverage package, with options for the imbibing, including sake, wine and cocktails, while juices, teas and mocktails may be part of the booze-free pairing.

Kaiseki-inspired dishes at Exhibition. Picture: Lachie Millard

On the topic of drinks, the restaurant will also feature a separate 10-seater bar with stunning iron bark beams and exposed brick for guests to come and relax in before or after dinner.

It will serve a snack menu of charcuterie from Brisbane favourites Saison, plus oysters and caviar, with their own specially designed cured duck products to launch in a few months.

The bar and restaurant will also feature a wine cellar – the restaurant taking the concept quite literally, hiding it behind steel bars. It will start with 50 wines and sake, and gradually build, with the plan to use it to age their own wine.

Meanwhile, the cocktail list – as curated by bar manager Aidan Perkins– will be unique, making use of ferments, vinegars and bi-products from the kitchen to create drinks that stand outside the box.

The 10-seater bar at Exhibition. Picture: Lachie Millard

At the restaurant, tables of two will be able to sit at the counter around the open kitchen with an incredible 300kg hand-built, stainless steel hibachi grill at its heart; while groups of four will cosy into the midnight blue banquette under barely there lighting and an ever-changing array of artworks.

Exhibition will serve its first customers on June 7, with reservations now open until the end of August, but booking out fast.

The restaurant will then release reservations three months in advance on the first Tuesday of each month at 11am.