Cipriani loses fight to use name in UK logo

The dispute leading to the latest decision dates back more than five years.

In 2008 Mr Justice Arnold ruled that Hotel Cipriani’s Community trade mark for Cipriani was infringed by Giuseppe Cipriani’s restaurant, then called Cipriani London.

Following an appeal, an injunction preventing the use of Cipriani or any confusingly similar name came into force in April 2010.

C's proposed logo

Cipriani London subsequently changed its name to C and also opened a restaurant called Downtown Mayfair.

Last month, Arnold was called on again to determine whether actual and planned logos used by C and Downtown Mayfair, and also Cipriani’s corporate website, breached the 2010 injunction.

In a decision on January 29, he ruled that the text in both the logos would breach the injunction, as would the historic website, which included a page devoted to London.

But he found that the latest version of Cipriani’s website, which does not include a London page, did not breach the injunction. “The only basis upon which counsel for [Hotel Cipriani] submitted that the current Website was targeted at UK consumers was that it was a global website targeted at a globe-trotting clientele. I do not accept that that is enough to make it targeted at UK consumers. There is nothing at all on the current website to indicate that it is targeted at the UK, as opposed to the US and other English-speaking countries,” explained Arnold.