Bart Blatstein

Progress at American Sardine Bar’s Outdoor Patio

Posted by Foobooz on May 7th, 2013

The back patio at American Sardine Bar is coming along nicely. Check out the progress over on Property, Philadelphia magazine’s real estate blog.

Blatstein Gives Up Controlling Interest in Piazza and Liberties Walk

Posted by Foobooz on February 7th, 2013

bart_blatstein-ryan-donnell

The Philadelphia Inquirer is reporting that Bart Blatstein has sold 60% of his interest in the Piazza at Schmidts and Liberties Walk. Kushner and Oaktree Capital Management L.P., a real estate investment fund are the buyers and the Inquirer estimates the deal is worth $130 million to Blatstein.

It would appear the deal gives Blatstein a cash infusion for his North Broad casino project, The Provence.

Blatstein sells controlling interest in Piazza, Liberties Walk [Philadelphia Inquirer]
Deconstructing Bart Blatstein [Philadelphia Magazine]

Sonata in Northern Liberties Has Closed

Posted by Foobooz on August 10th, 2012

A tipster informed us that Sonata in Northern Liberties has closed. The menu is down from outside the door and the windows covered. A call to the BYOB’s voicemail confirmed that they were closed for business as of yesterday and thanked their customers for three years of patronage.

Even in Craig LaBan’s praise filled review of Mark Tropea’s food at Sonata back in 2010, the sustainability of the business was a major concern.

Hopefully we’ll soon see Tropea cooking again soon.

UPDATE: Eater is reporting that a new Thai restaurant, Baan Thai, will be taking over the space.

Raw Out At Piazza

Posted by Victor Fiorillo on January 3rd, 2012

It seems like just months ago that I was telling you about Sansom Street sushi joint Raw getting an outpost at Bart Blastein’s mixed-use 80,000-square foot revolving door aka The Piazza at Schmidts, replacing Shola Olunloyo’s ill-fated Speck project. Oh wait. That’s because it was just months ago. Well, after what I hear was one helluva New Years’ Eve party at the complex (even my Enterprise car rental guy in Upper Darby said so), word comes that Raw is no longer open for business. Read the rest of this entry »

In The Magazine: Shola vs. Blatstein

Posted by Jason Sheehan on June 21st, 2011

For those of you who care about restaurants and chefs (and I mean really care about restaurants and chefs), one of the most maddening and mysterious stories of the past year has been the on-again/off-again promise of Speck Food + Wine–the never-opened (but widely theorized about) modern culinary wonderland by chef Shola Olunloyo. The man had done private, half-secret dinners that had become legendary among Philly’s swells, but never had a restaurant for the masses.

That was supposed to change with the opening of Speck which, itself, was supposed to be the culinary centerpiece of the Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties. But then…

Plans took shape in the spring of 2010. Presided over by Shola Olunloyo, the city’s most mystifying chef, the bistro was supposed to be the fine-dining showpiece of Bart Blatstein’s Piazza at Schmidts in Northern Liberties. Then, in March of this year, Blatstein locked Olunloyo out, effectively closing Speck before it even opened.

The million-dollar fiasco seems like a simple tale of a virtuous artist, an avaricious businessman and their inability to compromise. We all know how that story ends.

So much for simplicity.

Read the rest of this entry »

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Progress at American Sardine Bar’s Outdoor Patio

Blatstein Gives Up Controlling Interest in Piazza and Liberties Walk

Sonata in Northern Liberties Has Closed

Raw Out At Piazza

In The Magazine: Shola vs. Blatstein