The Estrella Damm Sustainability Award

Chet Sharma's Indian restaurant in Mayfair proves that you don't need to be based in the rolling hills of the countryside to have strong sustainability credentials. The restaurant serves progressive Indian food and this approach is carried through into its business practices with a focus on staff wellbeing that includes operating a 45-hour, four-day week, and excellent traceability and supply chain systems in place.

BiBi is the first ethnic restaurant to have won the sustainability award at the National Restaurant Awards and it impressed the Sustainable Restaurant Association (SRA), which carried out the judging in this category, for showing solid sustainability practices across its operations. BiBi's approach to staff wellbeing and treatment is substantial, it says, adding that this focus on staff comes at an important time for fine-dining where kitchen practices especially are having a moment of reconciliation.

"BiBi offers a different vision for what sustainable hospitality looks like. Not a countryside restaurant, not one with their own hands in the soil or on the land, but Indian fine dining in a major city, showing that luxury hospitality, a menu defined by global ingredients and traditions, and social and environmental responsibility can coexist and flourish," says Juliane Caillouette-Noble, CEO at The Sustainable Restaurant Association. 

"The restaurant has developed a farm-to-table approach adapted to the realities of a kitchen working across cultures and with global supply chains. That means British produce forms the foundation of the menu, complemented by carefully sourced ingredients from long-standing suppliers and growers in India who meet clear social and environmental standards."

BiBi also stood out for putting its teams at the heart of its operation. At a time when fine dining is reassessing its approach to workplace culture, Sharma offers an example of a chef who came up through demanding, high-pressure kitchens and chose to build something different, says the SRA. The restaurant offers wellbeing support and learning and development opportunities for its staff as well as exemplary maternity and paternity policies, and has embedded practices that go far beyond industry norms.

"Sustainability is not treated as a standalone initiative, but as something that guides every business decision," adds Caillouette-Noble. "BiBi provides exactly the kind of example the industry needs in 2026. By demonstrating that 'sustainable' itself is not a style of restaurant, but rather that conscious, people- and planet-focused action can be embedded into ambitious, high-end hospitality, Chet's team is offering an exemplary model for others to follow."