WITH a name inspired by the building's extensive history and a promise to bring something completely different to Bolton, new restaurant and bar The Courthouse is hoping to make a big impression.

The Mawdsley Street venue was previously known as Harvey’s Café Bar, until it closed suddenly in October of last year.

The refurbishment plans were announced in April and it is estimated around £350,000 has been spent on revamping it ahead of it's opening last Friday.

Some teething problems affected the first few days but the owners are confident that everything is now sorted.

Owner Krishan Patel, said: "We weren't quite ready on time unfortunately but we still had very good feedback. Everybody loves the place.

"We haven't had any real issues other than it being quite cold, which we had a few complaints about, but we've apologised and it's all been rectified now.

"We closed on Sunday and Tuesday to sort a few things and we officially reopened on Wednesday.

"All the food, drinks and atmosphere is exactly what we hoped for and expected and I'm really proud with the way its turned out."

Final cosmetic touches still need to be applied to the venue such as pictures and decorations that tie in with the Courthouse theme and Mr Patel thinks recognising the building's history is important.

He added: "The reason we've called it the Courthouse is because of the history and it's important we do as much as we can to relate what we're doing here to the history.

"It's such an amazing building and it's been our vision from day one to use that history to implement a theme."

Along with the new theme, the owners have introduced a new food menu and new range of drinks, including a full range of gin liqueurs from 'Sweet Little Liqueurs' - which they claim is the only one of its kind in the town.

Mr Patel said while he's taken a risk in opening a venue that's like nowhere else in Bolton, he hopes it's one that will pay off.

He said: "There's absolutely nowhere like this in Bolton.

"It's a risk we've taken. We've put a lot of money into a place in Bolton that's not like any other place.

"We're aiming it at people from Bolton, who usually go to Manchester, to try and give them an option. Whether it works or not, we don't know but we're hoping its going to.

"You don't need to spend £30 for a taxi, pay ridiculous pricing while you're there, it's just a nice place for working professionals to come and enjoy themselves."

“It’s going to be completely different. We’ve completely gutted it, everything’s brand new.

“Everything’s changed - all the food menus, all the drink menus and basically we’ve turned it more from a pub into a restaurant and bar.

“We’ve gone more modern but keeping with the character of the building and we’re going a bit more upmarket with it. The food’s going to be more upmarket as well.

“We’re aiming it a completely different market – young professionals.”

Refurbishment works have overrun by a couple of weeks as the job has got bigger and it is expected minor works will carry on in the first few days of it being open.

Mr Patel added: “It’s been five weeks, it was originally meant to be three but the job’s got bigger and bigger and we’ve just been putting more and more in. It’ll probably carry on for the next few days.

“We’ve invested around £300,000 but it’s expected to raise to about £350,000 by the time it’s done.”

On Friday November 23, there was a special invite-only launch party, and the official grand opening happened at noon on Saturday.

Mr Patel said he is excited for everybody to come down and see it for themselves.

“We had a launch party on Friday, which was guestlist only and we reached capacity on that,” he said.

“We have some big bookings for the grand opening as well.

“Everybody should come and check it out for themselves.”