A truly special restaurant can become as ingrained in a city’s cultural landscape as its museums, galleries and music venues.

Not just for the plates of food whisked from kitchen to customer with each service, but for the weight of the trailblazing legacy it carries and the memories of people from all walks of life who have broken bread there together over the years.

Café Gandolfi in Glasgow is one such place.

Opened in 1979 on Albion Street, in the former offices of Glasgow’s old Corporation Cheese Market, the restaurant was the brainchild of photographer Iain MacKenzie. He is said to have introduced Glasgow’s first cappuccino machine, giving the city its first taste of proper café society. He also championed the use of Scottish meat, fish and vegetables at a time when it was far from fashionable to do so.

In those days, the area now known as Merchant City was considered a rundown, “no-go” zone, which Seumas MacInnes, the current owner, described as full of “vacant warehouses, a Barras‑style weekend market and old‑man pubs”. Café Gandolfi is widely credited as a pioneer that kick‑started the regeneration of what would become a lively hub of restaurants, bars and shops.

Café Gandolfi first opened in Glasgow in 1979 (Image: Newsquest)

That reputation was cemented in the years that followed, when the business famously operated a no‑bookings system,........

© Herald Scotland