Covid-19 spells the end for Art Nouveau restaurant in Prague's Obecní dům

The French restaurant Art Nouveau in Prague's Municipal Building (Obecní dům) has declared insolvency and shut down, claiming it owed CZK 13.7m to more than 70 creditors. The restaurant, which is operated by the Prague firm French-Rest, produced CZK 132m in revenues last year and a CZK 2.4m profit. More than half of debt is owed to the company's 100-plus staff, while another 25 percent are social payments it didn't make to the state. The daily Hospodářské noviny writes that French-Rest demanded CZK 27.5m in compensation from the state, claiming that the support programs intended to help companies like it failed because banks refused to provide loans to restaurants. Its landlord reportedly offered to give it a discount on the CZK 4.5m it was supposed to pay in rent each quarter, but French-Rest says this still wouldn't be enough without the usual invasion of Prague by famished hordes of tourists. In its place, HN claims that the company Vysehrad 2000, which runs a cafe in Obecní dům, will take over the space.