Timeline

Growing up in Brookline, MA, both of Lydia’s parents were illustrators. At age four, she begins cooking alongside her father as he snipped recipes from the New York Times. As a young woman, Lydia enrolls in Le Cordon Bleu cooking school in London.

Lydia returns to Boston and within three years becomes head chef at Maison Robert restaurant. She then becomes the Bostonian Hotel’s first female chef, working alongside Jasper White, who becomes her friend and mentor.

Already on the culinary map, Boston was an up and coming, inspiring place to be a chef. The first of many awards to come, Lydia is included in the 50 Best Chefs in America by Cooks Magazine.

Lydia is awarded the coveted “Who’s Who of Food & Beverage” award by the James Beard Foundation in 1978.

Lydia is then asked to open the new Four Seasons Hotel in Beverly Hills, making her the first female chef to open a luxury property for the company.

Named after the iconic London fashion store, Lydia returns to Boston and opens her first restaurant Biba to great fanfare. In 1992 she receives the James Beard Foundation Award for “America’s Best Chef -Northeast”.

In 1994 Food & Wine names Shire “One of America’s Top Ten Chefs”. Lydia also earns the prestigious Ivy Award by Restaurant and Institutions magazine, and is nominated as “One of America’s Top Five Chefs” by the James Beard Foundation, in 1996.

 

 

In 2001, Lydia buys part of Locke-Ober in Boston and becomes the historic restaurant’s first female chef. Gourmet magazine ranks the restaurant 18th best in the country. During this time she also opens Pignoli in Copley Plaza, and Blue Sky restaurant at the Atlantic House Hotel in Maine.

Scampo

Since 2012, Lydia has brought her Italian-inspired cuisine to Boston at Scampo, located in the former Charles Street Jail. Named best new restaurant in 2016.

Lydia continues to bring her creative cuisine to Boston. Her son Alex has followed in her footsteps, working as executive chef at Scampo, and now as an up and coming chef on his own, having recently making it to the second round on “Chopped”.