Pinna

Verdict: A confident Mayfair Italian worth booking for classic cooking done with conviction

If you want modern Italian reinvention, Pinna is not your room. If you want Sardinian-rooted, classically minded Italian cooking in one of London's most polished postcodes, delivered by a team that actually seems pleased to see you, book it. At £££ in Mayfair, the pricing sits comfortably below the ££££ tier that dominates this neighbourhood, the Michelin Plate recognition for 2025 confirms the kitchen is operating at a level above the generic Mayfair trattoria. This is a place built around restraint and execution, it earns its following on those terms.

The Room and the Energy

Pinna's atmosphere is leading described as chic without trying to intimidate you. The energy tends toward lively rather than hushed, which makes it work as well for a Thursday dinner with a friend as it does for a quiet business lunch. The room reads as grown-up Mayfair: elegance without theatre, warmth without informality. The noise level at peak evening service is animated rather than deafening, which means conversation is still the point. If you're coming from a long day and want somewhere that feels genuinely welcoming rather than performatively cool, Pinna delivers that consistently. Service is a particular strength here; the team operates with the kind of considered attentiveness that the leading Italian rooms have always traded on, where the meal moves at your pace and requests don't generate visible stress.

The Cooking: Classical and Deliberate

Chef Achille Pinna, whose name the restaurant carries, cooks Italian food with a Sardinian sensibility and a clear philosophical position: tradition over novelty. The menu is structured around fresh seafood to open, standout pasta in the middle, prime cuts or fish of the day to close. Tiramisu and cannoli represent the dessert logic; not reinvented, not deconstructed, just done properly. This is the right approach for a room of this kind, it's a harder discipline than it looks. Classic Italian cooking at a high level requires sourcing precision and technical control that flashier tasting menus can obscure. Here there is nowhere to hide, the kitchen doesn't seem to need to.

The wine programme earned Pinna a White Star from Star Wine List in February 2025, which is a meaningful endorsement for a room of this size and positioning. If wine matters to your decision, that credential suggests the list has been put together with genuine thought rather than assembled from a distributor catalogue. For guests who treat the bottle as seriously as the plate, that matters.

Counter and Bar Seating

If bar or counter seating is available at Pinna (confirm directly when booking), it is worth requesting. Italian restaurants at this price point and with this kind of kitchen often reward counter proximity, you get a cleaner view of the pasta being worked, the seafood being plated, the pacing of service from source to table. Counter seats also tend to produce more natural interaction with the kitchen team, which suits the explorer-minded diner who wants to understand what they're eating rather than simply receive it. For solo diners or pairs in particular, counter seats at a room like Pinna are often the highest-value seats in the house. When booking, ask specifically about bar or counter availability.

Booking and Practical Details

Pinna is at 43 Curzon St, W1J 7UF, placing it in the heart of Mayfair, walkable from Green Park tube. Booking difficulty is moderate, this is not the impossible reservation it would be if it were ££££ and starred, but it fills, particularly for weekend evenings. Book at least two to three weeks ahead for prime slots. The Michelin Plate 2025 puts it in the tier of restaurants the Guide considers worth visiting even without a star, which in Mayfair is a meaningful filter. Smart casual is the safe dress assumption for a room of this address and ambiance, though Pinna appears to sit slightly less formally than the full ££££ Mayfair set.

Who Should Book Pinna

Pinna is the right choice if: you want Italian cooking that respects its confirmed details rather than modernising it for trend value; you're hosting someone who will appreciate service quality as much as food quality; you want a Mayfair room that doesn't require ££££ spend to feel appropriate to the setting. It is less suited to diners seeking a tasting menu format, experimental technique, or the kind of theatrical presentation that drives social content. For that, the ££££ tier in Mayfair has options. For a genuinely well-executed, classically anchored Italian dinner with a serious wine list and a team that takes hospitality seriously, Pinna is a strong pick in its category.

If you're building a London trip around food, our full London restaurants guide covers the full range of categories, the London hotels guide, London bars guide, London experiences guide, and London wineries guide round out the picture.

Pinna in the London Italian Landscape

Among London Italians in a similar register, Luca in Clerkenwell operates at a comparable price point with a British-Italian crossover approach that suits diners who want local provenance woven into the Italian framework. Bocca di Lupo in Soho covers regional Italian breadth with a more casual energy and is easier to book. Bancone focuses tightly on pasta at lower prices and is worth knowing if the mid-courses are what you're really coming for. Artusi in Peckham operates in a different neighbourhood and price register but shares the commitment to unfussy Italian cooking. For Mayfair specifically, Pinna positions itself as the serious Italian option that doesn't ask for the full ££££ outlay. Archway offers another reference point in the London Italian conversation worth checking depending on your location in the city.

Outside London, Italian cooking of comparable seriousness appears across the Pearl network in different cultural registers: 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo Bombana in Hong Kong and cenci in Kyoto show how Italian discipline travels. If you're also exploring UK fine dining beyond London, The Fat Duck in Bray, L'Enclume in Cartmel, Moor Hall in Aughton, Gidleigh Park in Chagford, Hand and Flowers in Marlow, and hide and fox in Saltwood represent the broader range of serious destination cooking across the country.