A Note on 1996 Group

1996 Group is our way of bringing everything we care about into one place.

Founded and led by Florence Mae, we work across food, design, and culture, using hospitality as the medium. What connects it all is a shared interest in Filipino identity, memory, and how those ideas evolve within London.The group exists as a framework for what we’re building now, and what comes next. It holds our restaurants, our bakeries, and the projects that sit alongside them.

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Panadera is our bakery.

Shaped around pandesal and the kinds of flavours we grew up with. In Soho, that takes form as our flagship space on Hopkins Street & our outpost in Marylebone serves as our lunch focused space. The name translates to female baker in Tagalog. We are constantly developing the bakery leaning into both Filipino flavours and European technique from our ube-filled doughnuts, laminated pastries, to seasonal specials that shift with the space.

Donia is our restaurant in Soho.

Recognised with a Michelin Bib Gourmand, it reflects a more considered side of what we do. The food draws from Filipino flavours, but is shaped by contemporary technique and the ingredients available to us here in the UK.

Opening in late 2023, the restaurant is changing and evolving all the time.

A modern hospitality collective

At its core, 1996 Group is about building spaces and ideas that bring people together.

We think about hospitality beyond just food, as something that includes design, storytelling, and collaboration. Each project is part of a wider conversation around culture, identity, and how those things are expressed today.

This is just the beginning of it.