Oxford Street is one of the most touristy and crowded areas of London. Amid all the crowds are also some of the worst chain restaurants that appeal to the mass market. However, hidden away, behind the doors of a beautiful Greek Revival church is one of the best-looking food halls in London. The building dates to 1828, with detailed stone arches and glowing stained glass windows. The church spent decades closed, but in 2019 it reopened as Mercato Mayfair, a food market inside the restored church.
It’s a great food spot if you are travelling with a group and everyone wants something different to eat. Food stalls are spread across the main floor and the balcony. You can get pizza, fresh pasta, bao, or Indian street food. The market focuses on sustainable ingredients. And down in the basement crypt, there is a craft brewery, a gin bar, and a wine shop. There is also a small roof terrace upstairs.
Quick facts
- Getting there: Bond Street is the Tube stop to use. The hall sits just south of Oxford Street, so it’s walkable from the shops but quieter than anything on the main strip. Taxis and ride-share drop at North Audley Street.
- Hours: Monday to Thursday noon to 11 pm, Friday and Saturday noon to midnight, Sunday noon to 10:30 pm, with coffee and breakfast from 10 am daily.
- Best time: weekday late afternoon, before the after-work crowd and the evening drinkers
- When to go: For atmosphere, a weekday afternoon. You get the space, the light through the windows, and seats in the side chapels. For energy, a Friday or Saturday evening, when hours run to midnight. Winter has an advantage: a building like this holds warmth well, and the stained glass reads better against dark afternoons
Why Is There a Food Hall in a Church
St Mark’s was built in 1825-28 and listed Grade I in 1958. The style is Neo-classical, the work of the architect John Gandy. Greek Revival was the fashion of the day for a fashionable parish, and it explains the portico you see from the street.
The church had a second life with a wartime twist. During the Second World War, it became informally known as the American Church in London, thanks to its closeness to the US embassy and its role as a centre for American worshippers. That identity gives the neighbourhood a thread: this corner of Mayfair has long been a place where Americans in London came together.
Worship eventually ended. An independent congregation used the church from April 1994 to June 2014. After that the building sat empty. The Grosvenor estate completed a two-year, £5m restoration of the “At Risk” deconsecrated church before opening it as a food hall. Grosvenor signed Mercato Metropolitano as anchor tenant in 2018 and brought in greig + stephenson Architects, who kept the changes reversible out of respect for the Grade I fabric.
How the hall is laid out
Many original features remain in place, including the chancel altar, the crypt, the stained-glass windows and the font, and the market covers nearly 1,500 square metres over four floors. Stalls sit on the ground floor and in a gallery overlooking the nave, with communal seating in the side chapels and a roof terrace. Sources disagree on whether it’s three floors or four, but all agree on the structure: nave below, gallery above, vaulted undercroft beneath
The undercroft is the part I’d look for. The vaulted brick basement had been largely unseen for decades, and the conversion sought to bring it back into use without diminishing its raw character. A craft beer bar sits around the former altar, serving beer brewed in the basement.
What to Eat
Bindas Eatery
Bindas is run by Mehak Kansal, a former property developer turned self-taught chef who began with a recipe blog and a supper club. The word “bindas” means daring or carefree. She won the 2018 Westfield Food Entrepreneur Award, which brought mentorship from Omar Allibhoy of Tapas Revolution, and the stall grew from there. The dish people talk about is the loaded paneer naan, topped with sweet chilli, pomegranate and fresh green chilli.
The mango lassi is the obvious drink to add. If you want something to compare it against, her cookbook lists a chilli-cheese naan among its recipes, so cheese and heat are part of her signature. Don’t confuse the hall stall with her restaurant on Princes Street. That is a separate site serving a broader street-food menu.
Fresco Pizzeria Napoletana
Fresco serves Neapolitan pizza, and the style carries real history. The art of the Neapolitan pizza maker was added to UNESCO’s intangible cultural heritage list in 2017, in part for its four-stage dough process and for baking exclusively in a wood oven. The stall’s best-known slice is the potato pizza on a thick crust with rosemary and sage.
Club Mexicana
Club Mexicana is the all-vegan stall, and its story is worth knowing. Founder Meriel Armitage launched it as a street-food stall in 2014. It then moved into a permanent spot at Kingly Court in 2020, which closed in 2026, though the Mayfair food-hall site remains open. The menu centres on vegan tacos and cocktails.
Dez Amore
Dez Amore is the pasta stall. Co-founder Leonardo Masi started selling fresh pasta in London in 2019, working alone for the first six months, and the business began at Mercato Metropolitano’s Elephant & Castle site. Some of the best dishes here are the tagliatelle, carbonara, gnocchi and ravioli. All of them make for a warm and cozy meal on a cold and rainy afternoon.
Molo
Molo is the one I’d save for an occasion. It does lobster, oysters and fish burgers, and it sits upstairs on the gallery level, so you eat looking down over the nave. I’d carry a drink up from the basement bar and take a seat in one of the side chapels. Check the board for prices before you commit, because seafood is where food-hall prices vary most.
Vnilla
Vnilla does one thing: banana pudding. The Mercato Mayfair listing describes it as vanilla cream, fresh bananas and classic vanilla wafers, with a rotating monthly special beside the signature. The brand became known through its Covent Garden shop, where a queue forms on Endell Street for just two puddings. The Mayfair stall is new, so confirm it’s trading before you plan around it. It’s best as a stand-alone dessert after a savoury stop elsewhere in the hall.
Badiani
My last stop before leaving. Badiani was founded in Florence in 1932, and its signature flavour, Buontalenti, is named after the architect said to have invented gelato.
Steamy & Co
If you want something lighter than pasta or pizza, this is my pick on the ground floor. Steamy & Co serves bao, dumplings, ramen and udon, with a menu built around East Asian street food staples. The stall has been trading since 2018, which makes it one of the longer-running names in the hall. It’s also a good choice for a mixed group, since it has lots of different vegetarian and vegan options.
The Crypt: Gin, Wine and Beer Under the Church
Go down to the basement and the hall changes character. The ceilings are vaulted, the walls are exposed brick, and the space was largely unseen for decades before the conversion. This is the oldest-feeling part of the building and the one I’d go downstairs for.
Jim & Tonic. The gin bar. It describes itself as organic and artisanal gin, and it also has a counter upstairs near the altar. Order a gin and tonic here rather than a cocktail you could get anywhere.
BeBeMe. A wine bar and shop in the crypt. It stocks wines from old-world classics to new-world discoveries. If gin isn’t your drink, this is where I’d sit.
German Kraft. This is where I need to correct myself. I’d originally described a brewery in the basement making beer on site, and that’s out of date. Brewing at Mayfair ceased in November 2024, when the equipment was removed, though the company kept the bar and sells beer brewed at Elephant. So you can still drink German Kraft beer here, but not watch it being made. Don’t plan a visit around a brewery tour, even though the hall’s brochure still lists them.
Oxford Street will always be a few minutes’ walk to the north, and most people will keep eating their lunch standing up on it. I’d rather you walked the extra few minutes to North Audley Street and stepped under the portico. St Mark’s has gone from a fashionable parish church to an American congregation’s wartime refuge, and from decades of closure to a room where strangers share long tables. The food is better in some places than in others, and I’d choose a stall by what you want that day. The reason to go is that a Grade I building is open to anyone with a few pounds and an appetite. Eat your pasta or your bao, then go down to the crypt and look up at the brick.
Happy Travels, Adventurers
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