Restaurateur Chris Lucas unveils plans for two new mega CBD venues in $1bn skyscraper project

Chin Chin boss Chris Lucas has thrown his support behind Melbourne’s struggling CBD, revealing he’s planning to open not one — but two — new restaurants as part of a $1bn project.

Chris Lucas (centre) with Janan Shareef (left) and Luke Headon. Picture: Tony Gough

Hospitality kingpin Chris Lucas is taking a “glass half full” approach to doing business in the struggling CBD by revealing he’s opening another two new restaurants.

Months before he launches French fine diner Batard, the Chin Chin boss said he’s inked a deal with developer Cbus Property to build a new $1bn dining destination in Melbourne’s untapped ‘mid-city’, slated to open in 2026.

The skyscraper will play home to Lucas’s first-ever Greek-Mediterranean restaurant and “new-style Chinese” concept.

Lucas said while the hospitality industry battled through hard times, he believed the city was making a comeback.

Lucas has inked a deal with developer Cbus Property to build a new $1bn dining destination. Picture: Tony Gough

“My father had this saying ‘a recession never follows a recession’, and while there is a bit of a downturn, I’m optimistic of where it’s going,” he said.

“These projects are long-term, planned five to six years out, and you have to put your belief into the project and vision, instead of reacting to short-term economic circumstances.”

Lucas, who last fortnight was revealed as a board member of new industry lobby group Australian Restaurant Cafe Association, said the city reminded him of a mini-Manhattan.

“Melbourne is transitioning from a workplace to a cosmopolitan, New York style, city,” he said.

“We’re changing from more offices to apartments in the CBD, and with more and more residents, this will energise the city.”

“Yes, maybe traffic on Monday to Friday is down, but I think the night time and weekends are up. And yes there’s a debate that workers aren’t coming into the city as much as they did, but the traffic that’s dropping is more than made up for in people coming in for dinners and theatre shows.”

As the local hospitality industry crumbles under cost of living pressures, the restaurateur is one of the few operators to rise above the challenges, snapping up investments and going toe-to-toe in a real life game of Monopoly with Sydney billionaire Justin Hemmes.

He rejected claims big restaurant groups like Lucas Restaurants, and Justin Hemmes’s Merivale, were saturating the city’s new restaurant market.

“I’m not BHP, I’m not Facebook, I don’t own a $100m yacht. We are relative in that we are a tiny industry made up small industries … we really aren’t that big,” he said.

“I think instead of critiquing and diving the industry, we should be looking at whoever is prepared to run a restaurant in Australia — and applaud them, as (running restaurants) is the hardest business to run in the world.”

Construction on the 48-storey tower on Bourke and Queen streets has already begun, with Lucas’s two unnamed restaurants residing on the ground floors in a similar set up to Society, Lillian and Yakimono at his 80 Collins St hub, and Grill Americano at 101 Collins.

Earlier this year he launched Club Chin Chin at Geelong’s GMHBA Stadium to a roaring success. Lucas is also opening Batard this spring, and Carlotta; a Mediterranean venue in Canberra, later this year.