Cult-favourite coastal patisserie Eclair at the Bay has landed in Newstead
Eclair at the Bay is entering a new phase. Swapping Byron Bay for Brisbane, the patisserie has unveiled a chic Newstead location designed for growth. With bigger ambitions and a larger kitchen, founders Pavel Stolarsky and Mary Martin are ready to take their cakes, craquelins, croquembouches and delicate choux pastry creations to the masses.
While their patisserie concept may have started from humble beginnings, Pavel Stolarsky and Mary Martin now harbour big dreams for Eclair at the Bay.
What started as a COVID-era gamble has evolved, first from an eclair delivery service to a gourmet market stall, then into a 35-sqm shop situated in the heart of Byron Bay.
The latest iteration of the concept sees Pavel and Mary exchanging the idyllic coastal surrounds of Byron for the gritty concrete-clad streets of Newstead, where they’ve just opened a brand-new shopfront. While the site’s physical destination wasn’t pre-determined, the couple says that expansion was written in the stars.
“I would say from day one we were thinking bigger,” Mary tells us, just days before Eclair at the Bay’s official opening.
Those of us caught up in the inner-city rat race might raise an eyebrow at the thought of swapping Byron for Brisbane, but for Mary and Pavel there was a method to the madness. In order to take Eclair at the Bay to the masses, they had to find a location that offered the right kind of fertile ground to achieve consistent growth, so they cast their eyes northward.
“We wanted to grow in a place where there was a larger population – Byron Bay is always fluctuating with its tourist population,” says Mary.
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“We already had customers driving from Brisbane and the Gold Coast to Byron Bay. We did some research and we found that Brisbane was starting to boom in terms of culture and food, so we thought maybe the right people were here.”
In a fortuitous stroke of luck, the ideal site presented itself to the couple in the form of Jocelyn Hancock’s former Commercial Road venue, Cake & Bake, which had sat empty since 2024.
“We met [Jocelyn] just randomly on Instagram, and she invited us to see the location, even when it was not on the market,” says Pavel.
In Mary and Pavel’s hands, the site has been transformed into a chic, European-inspired patisserie, boasting a white and royal blue colour scheme. The front-of-house area is minimally adorned, with the shop’s pastry display deservedly drawing much of the attention.
Tucked away in the rear of the space is Éclair at the Bay’s kitchen – a significantly larger setup compared to its original Byron Bay shop, built to handle retail, pre-order and catering production.
With more elbow room comes a larger range of goodies. Inside the display sits a broad selection of French-inspired treats, ranging from the brand’s signature eclairs and choux pastry desserts to tarts, craquelins, croquembouches and celebration cakes – all made using top-quality ingredients like Belgian chocolate, free-range eggs and silky creme Mousseline.
Flavours vary, with a core range of eclairs (including chocolate, vanilla, salted caramel and lemon eclairs) available alongside rotating seasonal and experimental options.
“In Byron, we used to have like three or four flavours of eclair per day, maximum, and then here we have 15 flavours, they won’t all fit, but we want to do at least six to seven – like five main options and then one that changes every week,” says Mary.
“I think there is room for creativity as well – we’re not so much about trends, but we’ll try a matcha or apple crumble eclair for example. We might try variations of choux pastry as well, like experimenting with savoury choux pastry.”
Other drool-worthy desserts include vanilla profiteroles, lemon and Italian meringue tarts, mousse-like choco pillows and pistachio praline craquelins. While the team is ready and willing to craft confections for weddings, birthdays and corporate events, Mary stresses that sweets don’t need to be a special-occasion splurge.
“You don’t need an excuse to have a dessert – it can be for a celebration or just because you want a treat on a Friday,” says Mary. “It’s something that you don’t need, you just have it because it brings you joy.”
With a commercial-grade kitchen on site, Eclair at the Bay is also well-equipped to expand further in the future, with a view towards perhaps finding more waterfront locations.
“Our goal is to open maybe a few small shops around Brisbane, which will give us more opportunity to build a community in the city,” adds Pavel. “We have a big production kitchen, so everything can be produced here and distributed around the city.”
Though this new chapter for Eclair at the Bay is bittersweet for Mary and Pavel, the duo hasn’t forsaken the patisserie’s coastal origins throughout its relocation process.
“We didn’t want to change our name, because we had the vision of opening in different bays across Australia,” says Mary, with a laugh. “It’s a big vision for the long term, but Brisbane is the first step towards it.
“There is no bay in the city, but it’s okay – it’s our name, it’s Byron Bay, it’s where we came from, so we decided to keep it. We’re a bit sad to leave the community in Byron, but we’re super excited for this new adventure.”
Eclair at the Bay is now open to the public – head to The Directory for operating hours and other important details.
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