The bricks are done. That’s wonderful news for Downtown Mall rats and merchants alike. And we’re happy for both parties, but foodies, there is an abundance of patios out there beyond the confines of the Mall. We won’t list all of the spots with decks and such here, but we do want to alert you to some exciting exterior restaurant developments. First is Bang!. The Asian tapas hot spot already has a backyard patio, and now the vintage Victorian house on Second Street SW is getting a new front patio designed by STOA Design +Construction—the team behind Zocalo and X Lounge. Turns out, though, the new open air seating area that will accommodate four tables is slightly less exciting than owners Tim Burgess and Vincent Derquenne had originally planned. For one, it’s about half the size they’d proposed to Charlottesville’s Board of Architectural Review (BAR) months ago.
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Bang! co-owners Vincent Derquenne, pictured, and Tim Burgess, were stymied in their original deck expansion plans by shrubbery that the Board of Architectural Review considered important to the neighborhood feel. |
“We wanted to create something more modern and more Asian,” says Derquenne. They’d proposed to remove three old dogwood trees (at least one of which “is rotting,” says Derquenne), affix a removable decking material made of Ipe, a South American hardwood, and screen the area from the parking lot across the street with a modern steel railing and Asian-inspired but native plantings such as Virginia bamboo and other native grasses. According to SIOA architect Michael Savage, the BAR balked at the design and said it was “inappropriate for the area,” says Savage.
The BAR wanted something “more integrated with the historic context of South Street; something that looks more like the front yards there, with shrubs,” says Savage. Restaurantarama finds it hard to understand what’s “appropriate” for an area that prominently showcases an ugly concrete parking lot, but what do we know. In any case, after the BAR shot down the initial proposal, STOA and Bang! came up with a redesign that would and did pass. Says Savage: “It doesn’t really have an aesthetic.” The patio will retain two of the dogwoods (hence, half the amount of seating originally proposed), will be hardscaped in bluestone and will include those ever important shrubs. Still, the steel railing will give it a modern twist, and Savage says they’ll be planting some interesting herbs in and around the bluestones to give the area a really nice scent. Savage expects the work to be completed in about a week.
Another restaurant with patio news is Zinc on W. Main Street. The existing exterior seating section is getting a facelift, and thankfully for its designers, Alloy Workshop, there were no area shrub precedents to contend with. “We are replacing the existing bamboo fence around the perimeter with a corrugated, galvanized metal fence with up and down lighting built into the fence. We’re also cleaning up the planter edging and replacing some of the existing conifers with tall grasses and formalizing the herb garden that is already there,” says Alloy architect Dan Zimmerman, who says the only issue raised by the BAR in its approval was the addition of “Zinc” welded into the metal fence. Turns out, there’s a two-sign per building limit. Hmm. Restaurantarama is pretty sure we count more than that on some other buildings along W. Main, but again, what do we know.
And finally, The Local in Belmont now has a front balcony accommodating about six tables. The metal railing was welded by part-time fabricator, part-time filmmaker Johnny St. Ours. Local owner Adam Frazier says he had no issues with the BAR on his project. Lucky duck.
