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Local artisans and foragers were tapped to supply the restaurant. The Nagatani family of Iga, Japan produced various donabe, or earthenware pots, for the restaurant, as well as dishware, vases and serving vessels. Each piece is hand made by master potters.
Lacquerware was produced over a year for the restaurant by Yamanaka of the Ishikawa Prefecture. The water cups were made by SUS Gallery in Tsubame, Japan, a city with a 350-year history in metal working. Single Thread’s water cups are hand hammered from vacuum-layer titanium, which prevents heat transmission from hands. Ice hardly melts and there’s little condensation.
AvroKo custom designed furnishings for the 55-seat restaurant and five-room inn. Investor partners in the property include UP Ventures and Plan Do See/Omotenashi Hotels from Japan.
The farm is on land owned by the Seghesio Family Winery, but the wine list will include broader offerings from California, including rare vintages going back to the 1970s, as well as bottles from Old World regions in Europe.
The long-awaited Single Thread opened in early December in Healdsburg, Calif., a concept created by Kyle and Katina Connaughton as an immersive culinary ride through Sonoma Wine Country. The inn and restaurant are served by their five-acre farm. There’s even a fantasy-like video trailer to give guests a taste of the attention to detail that went into the boutique property’s development.
Kyle Connaughton is the former head chef of research and development for the three-Michelin-starred Fat Duck restaurant in England, named the best restaurant in the world by Restaurant magazine in 2006. He previously worked as chef for the restaurant Michel Bras for three years in Hokkaido, Japan, and, before that, cooked his way through the kitchens of some of Los Angeles’ top restaurants, including Spago, Lucques, AOC, and the Dining Room at the Ritz Carlton Huntington Hotel.
A thread of Japanese cooking has run through Kyle Connaughton’s career. He started in high school as an apprentice at a Japanese restaurant in Southern California and later attended the California Sushi Academy and Sushi Chef Institute, interning in Japanese restaurants both in the U.S. and Japan. Connaughton spent three years cooking with Michael Bras in Japan before joining Heston Blumenthal to open the Fat Duck in 2006.
The menu changes nightly, but might include dishes like Spanish mackerel with lily bulb, Satsuma mandarin and purple basil flowers; Monterey Bay abalone “ibushi-gin,” served in a sauce of its livers with slow-cooked onion and myoga; or black cod “fukkura-san” with leeks, brassicas from the farm, and chamomile dashi.
Katina Connaughton and her brother Vince Rothermund run the farm, which includes a greenhouse, loamy fields, chicken coops, an heirloom fruit orchard, olive trees, bee hives, and a cattle paddock surrounded by vines of cabernet sauvignon, zinfandel and chardonnay.
The farm supplies fruit, vegetables, herbs, flowers, honey, eggs and olive oil to the restaurant kitchen.
