Nick Bril

“

Creating moments that stay with you.
That’s my ambition as a chef and entrepreneur.

I was trained at Ter Groene Poorte and over years spent in the kitchen at the Oud Sluis. I gradually developed my own signature. A style in which precision and layered flavours flow together with influences from the world kitchen. One that binds everything together with a strong narrative line. Because stories taste better.

We opened The Jane in 2014. Setting: a former chapel in the Groen Kwartier in Antwerp.
Over eleven years, our restaurant grew to international recognition with two Michelen stars

In 2025, the story of The Jane is starting a new chapter. This time it’s on Het Eilandje.
Here, I’ve found the space to deepen and refine my vision on cooking and hospitality.

Without tension, there’s no magic. I create tension by bringing elements together.
For years, art, design and music have coloured how I look at gastronomy and hospitality. That will continue to be the case. Because my philosophy is that if the conversation at the tables falls quiet, the details of the room take over.

There is a new dimension being brought to life with our centrally positioned kitchen:
an atmosphere in which our guests and team fuse together as one.

For me, cooking and music feed each other. They’re two ways of telling stories and making emotion tangible.
Behind the turn tables or with my pans: it’s all about rhythm. Energy. The cadence of an experience. Harmony.

That search for harmony also plays a part outside my work. As a father and businessman, I attach just as much value to balance as to ambition. I’m aiming at a balance that feeds my creativity and makes my vision sharper.

This is how I create moments that stay with you.
Discrete, intense and personal.

”

Nick