JD Wetherspoon will open its first pub on the Isle of Man in mid-May. It has taken on an old restaurant unit on Regent Street in Douglas. The pub will be called The Conister Arms.
Market Halls is to open a fifth venue, and first outside London, after acquiring the Shelter Hall on the seafront from Sessions. Market Halls’ other sites are in Canary Wharf, Oxford Street, Paddington and Victoria.
ASK Italian opened this week at the Animate leisure development in Preston. It is the brand’s 67th UK location. 
The Boparan Restaurant Group opened the first UK location for the US-based Carl’s Jr brand at the St David’s shopping centre in Cardiff this week. It is a 50-cover unit.
Rudy’s, the pizza group run by Mission Mars, will shortly open a restaurant in Brighton, local media report. The 3,500 square feet site will have 160 covers. Rudy’s opened in Leamington Spa this week and also has sites in the pipeline in Cambridge and West Bridgford.
Brasserie and bar brand Browns opened in Southgate this week. It follows a conversion by parent group Mitchells & Butlers of a pub that was run under the Village Inns brand. Browns now has 28 restaurants. It has another opening lined up in Bushey Heath in Hertfordshire—a conversion of a Harvester restaurant.
Steakhouse group Flat Iron opened its latest new restaurant next to the Royal Festival Hall on London’s South Bank this week. It is a 220-cover site. Flat Iron now has 15 restaurants.
BookBar, a bookshop, wine bar and coffeehouse concept in Highbury, is to open a second location on Chelsea Manor Street in Chelsea.
D&D London’s longstanding Chelsea restaurant Bluebird launched a second site on South Place in the City this week.
Modern Indian group Kricket has signed for a new site at Neal’s Yard in Covent Garden’s Seven Dials. The all-day restaurant, café and bar will open later this year in a 4,000 square feet site with 130 covers.
London-based Italian restaurant concept Emilia’s Crafted Pasta is opening a new flagship 100-cover site near Victoria station. It will launch in the Summer, becoming the fifth restaurant for the group after Aldgate, Baker Street, Canary Wharf and St Katharine Docks.
Cinema and leisure operator The Light opens at the Kingsgate shopping centre in Huddersfield next week. The 70,000 square feet venue over three floors will have a restaurant, bar, cinema, arcade and 15 different leisure activities. It will become The Light’s 14th UK site.
Loungers has submitted plans to open a Lounge in Haverhill in Suffolk, local media report.
Slim Chickens is opening a two-floor, 5,200 square feet restaurant with seating for 175 people at the entrance to the food court of the Merry Hill centre in the west Midlands. It will launch in May.
Japanese brand Maki & Ramen has announced openings in Leicester, Nottingham and Newcastle over the Summer. The Leicester site will be at the Highcross centre, the Nottingham one on King Street in a unit previously occupied by Wildwood, and the Newcastle restaurant in Eldon Square. Maki & Ramen currently has nine sites.
Mexican brand Chipotle opens at the Lakeside shopping centre this weekend.
Oodles Wok opened this week in Loughton in Essex.
Vietnamese restaurant Café Mama Pho, which has sites in Deptford and South Kensington, is opening a site on Marchmont Street in Bloomsbury in the Summer.
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To read the previous new openings round-up, click here.
