ONE OF Dublin’s longest running Chinese restaurants, the Imperial on Wicklow Street, has closed after being put into receivership by the Bank of Ireland.

Turley Property Advisers is now to seek rental offers in excess of €150,000 or more than €1.5 million for the outright sale of the building which is located on a particularly busy stretch of Wicklow Street.

Jim Luby of McStay Luby has been appointed receiver to Flowlawn, a company associated with the Cheung family, who ran the business for many years. The restaurant is understood to have been trading for more than half a century. It was originally known as The Universal and had a single door entrance and a long, narrow corridor leading to the dining area at the rear of the building.

The owners later acquired the Benetton shop fronting on to Wicklow Street and enlarged the restaurant to allow it to seat up to 200 diners. Over the years it attracted a large number of Chinese customers – testament to the high quality of the meals. Last year another long running Chinese restaurant, Sans, on Dame Street, also closed.

The overall restaurant including the basement and mezzanine extend to 380sq m (4,000sq ft). The rear of the restaurant including the kitchen, part of the basement and mezzanine are leased in from separate owners, Sherbrook, and will not be included in any sale. However, the lease of these areas is due to run for another 25 years.

The upper floors at the front of the Wicklow Street building are let under long leases at a current rent of €40,000 per annum.