Damien Hirst’s Restaurant Has Been Slammed with a Terrible Hygiene Rating

Any restaurant that charges £40 ($60) for a lobster better have its shit together behind the scenes. Especially when said restaurant claims to be "famous" for "fresh, locally sourced produce."

The Quay in Ilfracombe, England is one such restaurant. And while the restaurant is undoubtedly famous, that might have more to do with its owner than with the freshness of its produce.

It's owned by Britain's richest artist, Damien Hirst, who has an estimated net worth of $300 million and owns some of the most valuable real estate in England. That being said, Hirst is known more for diamond-encrusted skulls and embalmed tiger sharks than for steamed lobster, and was long considered the enfant terrible of contemporary art in the UK.

And now, the Quay has a second claim to fame. Unfortunately, once again, it's not for the "fresh, locally sourced produce," but, in fact, the opposite. The Quay was dealt a one-star rating by Devon County Council health inspectors, The Daily Mail reported.

Inspectors found raw meat stored among other ingredients and a "very dirty" drain, they wrote in their report, adding that The Quay was a "high-end restaurant with some high-risk activities" like sushi, carpaccio, and sashimi.

Cleanliness aside, the inspectors also took issue with the irregularity of compliance, citing a "significantly varying record of compliance, poor appreciation of hazards and control methods. As a result, the restaurant went from the highest hygiene rating (five-star) down to the second-lowest (one-star) in one fell swoop, and all of England now knows about it.

"We take health and hygiene at the Quay extremely seriously. There were two issues raised during this recent inspection," a spokesperson for the restaurant said.

"First was a failure to comply with the required paperwork. We have already taken steps to rectify this and are working hard to make sure we keep up to date with paperwork in the future. Second was a disused drainage pipe, located in a storage room underneath the kitchen."

"The drainage pipe had passed previous inspections but we were asked to fill it in, and this has now been done," the restaurant claimed. "We were also asked to separate vacuum-packed meat from ready-to-eat food in our freezer, which we have now done."

This isn't Damien Hirst's first brush with restaurant trouble. Over a decade ago, he took over one of London's swankiest restaurants, which ended up going belly-up amidst trouble with business partners. And while this recent hygiene transgression may be "on brand" for a subversive, eccentric artist like Hirst, it's not an ideal situation for a high-end restaurant.