Paul Goodale, director of restaurants and kitchens at iconic Knightsbridge department store Harrods, has left his position to concentrate on new opportunities, including the roll out of a gourmet pizza brand.

Goodale, who famously organised the French Laundry pop-up with Thomas Keller, for which he won the Independent Marketing Campaign Catey in 2012, left Harrods last month after more than three years.

He will continue to run his restaurant consultancy business Epicurean Holdings and focus on the expansion of PizzaLuxe, a gourmet pizza brand he owns together with his partner Laura Pabon.

PizzaLuxe currently has one outlet at Westfield Stratford City and plans to open a second site at Trinity Kitchen in Leeds in mid-October. It is currently negotiating a second site in London.

At Harrods Goodale was responsible for the complete overhaul of its restaurant portfolio, which now comprises 30 outlets. Under his leadership, the department store opened a number of high profile sites, including Galvin Demoiselle with the Galvin family, and Bentley’s with Richard Corrigan. It also recently hosted the Identita Italian chef congress, with top chefs including three-Michelin-starred Massimo Bottura and Enrico and Roberto Cerea.

Goodale started his career with the Hyatt Hotels Corporation before joining Sir Terence Conran’s company as pre-opening F&B manager of the Great Eastern Hotel and then working as group general manager at Conran Restaurants. He subsequently joined the Bank Restaurant Group as operations director and was chief operating officer and chief executive at FishWorks. He joined Harrods as a consultant in 2009 and became full-time director of restaurants and kitchens in 2010.

Harrods was unavailable for comment.

https://www.thecaterer.com/articles/348882/paul-goodale-leaves-harrods-to-focus-on-pizzaluxe