Meet Sebastian & Christian

"Sincerity in all forms; craftsmanship, the joy of repetition and giving people the opportunity to feel at home."

We at Goods like both Ved Stranden 10 and Admiralgade 26 a lot! So, can you tell us about how you started out?

Like everything else which is worthwhile in life, we started with a kiss, in the most platonic sense of the word, with congeniality and appetite. Besides, both of those places seemed manifestly important and nearly impossible at the beginning (phrase borrowed from Dr. Edwin H. Land, Polaroid)...and they proved to be. Well, at least nearly impossible and maybe modestly important.

Your newest place Admiralgade 26 has quite a Japanese influence - why is that?

We went to Tokyo in 2015 while the people from Noma were out there. We discussed the trip thoroughly and agreed that going to Tokyo for lunch was the only reasonable thing to do. We arrived at the 38th floor straight from the airport and started on what turned out to be a 36 hour lunch with jet lag. In retrospect, we were actually surprised that it proved to be not only reasonable, but also a very defining experience for us. We had a feeling of belonging in Japan, despite, at the same time, having that clear impression of being complete strangers that most foreigners encounter. We also went to Kyoto and stayed at the Roykan Tawaraya. An experience that actually answered many of our questions regarding hospitality and how to handle such things; the craftsmanship and patience and meticulousness great service entails, but also design and the ambition to create high quality, but unpretentious surroundings, this inspired us to think of the human aspect as the potential main driver of our endeavours (rather than straightforward commercial content and profit), the sense of history and proportion, how to eat a proper, dignifying meal in the age of social media and how to re-invoke sensibility and presence etc. etc. etc Those questions and their Japanese responses ended up shaping Admiralgade 26 and are somehow embedded into the fabric of the place. We even ended up working with the concept of Tokonoma, so Japanese and Danish culture turned out to be much more related than we assumed. Sitting in a Wegner chair at a traditional hotel in Kyoto seemed very natural and the Japanese influence at Admiralgade 26 should feel the same.

We also really like the interior of the place, how do you link the interior with what you serve? Is there a link?

Yes, there is a connection of course, the bridging is an idea and concept of quality or, maybe to put it more precisely; sincerity. Sincerity in all forms; craftsmanship, the joy of repetition and giving people the opportunity to feel at home. Our interior and what’s on the plate, not to mention in the glass, transports a set of values, a perspective on the world and of being in it, and is, as such, not only a means of well-being, but also of inspiration, criticism, and perspective. The most direct connection between food, wine and interior unfolds on our movie nights when the servings turn out to be echoes of the movie we have chosen. The most recent one, Paolo Sorrentino’s La Grande Bellezza, was accompanied by Minestrone, Pasta all’amatriciana, Saltimbocca alla Romana, Sea urchin and Maritozzi, served on silver plates with the outmost decadence, cocktails and wine at your discretion - as the invitation put it.