In the upscale Heritage on the Garden condo building, Bistro du Midi has replaced Excelsior, offering a taste of Provence—via London—overlooking Boston’s Public Garden. The latest venture of U.K.-based MARC Restaurant Group, the venue is a comfortable yet upscale space that mixes rustic touches such as exposed wooden beams, blown glass pendant lighting, and wrought-iron chandeliers with creamy walls, sleek leather bar tools, and signed Matisse, Dali, and Picasso lithographs.
The bilevel bistro includes a first-floor café with seating for 22, an open kitchen, and a 16-seat bar with a soaring mirrored backdrop. New floor-to-ceiling windows that overlook Boylston Street, offering unrivaled views of the Public Garden, will open when weather permits, and patio seating will be available for as many as 16.
While the elevator from the restaurant’s previous incarnation is still intact for handicap accessibility, it’s played down and overshadowed by a winding staircase leading to the second-floor bar and dining room. The warmly lit, cozy main dining room has a new fireplace, seats 116, and includes two smaller event spaces: a private dining room that seats 16 behind sliding wooden doors and a semiprivate room that holds 10 and is separated from the main dining room by a sheer, floor-length curtain. The entire restaurant is also available for buyouts, and Bistro du Midi’s staff can tailor table and seating arrangements to each event.
Lunch and bar bites—think eggplant and olive dip with crostini, chestnut soup, and Nicoise salad—are available downstairs, while a full dinner menu is available in the second-floor dining room. A mainstay of the bistro’s menu is the wine: there are 1,100 options and a glass-enclosed storage area with about 10,000 bottles.
