PEKING duck will be swapped for pizza following the recent closure of a Chinese restaurant and the arrival of a new Italian eatery.

Popular Chinese restaurant The Mayflower has been based in Cirencester for six years but, due to personal reasons, the owner has decided to focus his attentions on his other Cheltenham-based Chinese restaurant.

“I will miss everything about Cirencester,” said owner Chun Kong. “It is a lovely town with very supportive, kind and polite people. I couldn’t have wished for better customers.”

The restaurant is proud to be entirely family run. Chun Kong and his family moved to the area in 1973 and opened the Cheltenham Mayflower in 1982.

Following its success and popularity and with staff seeing Cirencester residents often making their way to the establishment, a Cirencester Mayflower was opened in 2007 on Sheep Street.

However, Chun explained that the managing of the Cirencester restaurant eventually got too much for the family, who all live in Cheltenham.

“It just got to the stage when we were all driving in different cars, seven days a week to Cirencester. It became quite silly. We can walk to work in Cheltenham,” continued Chun.

Chun is also a big supporter of local charities and is a trustee for the Gloucestershire Community Foundation and a committee member for Cheltenham festivals, among others. The Mayflower often supports various charities financially too.

He said he hopes to see his Cirencester customers still visit the restaurant on Clarence Street in Cheltenham.

“We would love to see them still visit us. Many of them would come to Cheltenham before we opened the Cirencester restaurant.”

The empty Mayflower building in Cirencester has since been snapped up by Fratello’s, an authentic Italian fine dining restaurant due to open around late November time. Fratello's already has one restaurant in Swindon but the new Cirencester eatery will be run by Italo and Mario Assogna who used to manage Pino's in Lechlade.

"Cirencester only has one Italian restaurant and it is very small," said Italo. "We want to bring something new to the town. We have chefs coming from Italy and we've had lots of experience in this area of work. We hope to do something really good here."