MY Businesses
Ostara Restaurant & Bar
Etablished 2018 - Completed 2025
Ostara was my dream from I was 19. After working over a decade in this industry, everything from cafés to Michelin stars restaurants, I got the desire to create my own. A restaurant and bar to show how good plant based food can be, a place you drink because it taste good and not to get drunk and really give people an experience out of the ordinary.
I was the founder, 100% owner of Ostara restaurant and bar which opened in Nov 2019 in Oslo. I actually built 90% of the interior with my own two hands. It was 16h long days for three months, but was one hell of a creative experience. In the beginning, I was everything; the chef, the bartender, the marketer, the economist, and the manager. The themed we focused on was natural wine, saké, sour beer, and vegetables, with live piano on Wednesday and served dark sweaty techno and psy in the weekends.
After five years I closed down Ostara because I was carrying too many businesses at once, completely overworked, and with no motivation left. Running a restaurant is tough, and it was a journey filled with sweat and tears, while the financial return remained limited and unpredictable. I tried to sell the business, but with upcoming building renovations, we were given the option to end the contract early, and I chose to close the doors in February 2025.
This became a beautiful process of learning how to let go and grieve what Ostara was and what it could have become. Ostara was my first business, and it taught me so much. I am grateful for what it was, for the foundations it built in me, but I do feel tremendous relief in no longer being in that industry. What saddens me most, however, is that I didn’t get to enjoy it as much as I had wished, as it became too much work, responsibility, and stress.
Ostara was never just a restaurant — it was my first dream that came true, a seed of community, a canvas for creativity, and a teacher of resilience.
