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Remember when going for a pizza meant choosing between Pizza Hut and Pizza Express? One lured you in with its (somewhat greasy) leather banquettes, stuffed crusts and irresistible bottomless salad bar. The other seduced you with dough balls, little flowers in blue vases and an indefinable aura of ’90s sophistication. Both seemed unassailable, the pepperoni-peddling giants of the high-street restaurant scene. But these days, their lustre has faded, and a hectic array of London mini-chains are duking it out for supremacy. Yard Sale, Pizza Union, Franco Manca, Mamma Dough and many others are all serving up woodfired pizzas with delicious, creative toppings. And with a limited (if hungry) pool of customers to fight for, not all of them can keep on expanding indefinitely.
Pizza don Homeslice recently put up signs on its Shoreditch and Fitzrovia restaurants saying that they were temporarily closed. But documents seen by Eater suggest that these premises are on the market, with the Old Street site apparently commanding an eyewatering £135,000 per annum in rent.
Homeslice still has its original branch in Neal’s Yard in Covent Garden, as well as two newer sites in Marylebone and the City. Still, it’s a real shame to see this pizza pioneer shrinking its London presence. It was an early arrival on the haute pizza scene when it first opened up in 2013, thrilling Time Out’s critic with its inventive bone marrow and chard toppings. Since then, it’s built up a loyal fanbase for its delicious and gigantic pizzas, sold by the slice (£4.50-£5.50 each) or whole (£24-£32), to be shared between two or three people. Last year, some super keen Homeslice customers even got its pizzas tattooed on their bodies in exchange for a lifetime's supply of free slices. Seems extreme, but pizza loyalties aren’t to be trifled with, whether you’re a Pizza Hut nut, a Pizza Express loyalist, or a now-embattled Homeslice fan.