Sandra Manzano

Floor manageress and maître at Casa Marcial** (Arriondas, Parres, Asturias, Spain)

From a tender age, almost single-handedly she learned her passion for the business and hospitality at her parents' bar-cum-shop, the house she grew up in, and the place now known as the Casa Marcial restaurant.

For 28 years she has been floor manageress and maître at Casa Marcial, teaming up with brother and sister Nacho and Esther Manzano in her teens to help out on the floor at the newly opened restaurant with another sister, Olga. She completed her academic studies in social work while working at the restaurant, and eventually settled in as floor manageress at the family business.

Sandra Manzano also works alongside her siblings at the La Salgar restaurant in Gijón, which has one Michelin Star and two Repsol "Sol" awards, and in the more urban, casual Gloria restaurants in Oviedo and Gijón. She also personally supervises and manages the other family business, Catering Manzano, where she has been organising social and corporate events for over 15 years.

Her latest project is the Narbasu restaurant at the Palacio de Rubianes hotel, which offers a cuisine inspired by the origins of Casa Marcial, landscape gastronomy where the main event is the product, for simple, tasty concoctions with the flavour of the land.