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Palm Beach Daily News
Palm Beach is set to have its first waterfront restaurant in a year’s time, after a string of presentations left town officials ecstatic over the opening of Tutto Mare, a fine dining eatery to accompany the rebuilt Royal Poinciana Playhouse.
The meetings marked a milestone in the nine-year effort to reopen the historic Royal Poinciana Playhouse.
Most recently, modifications to the doors on the west and east facade of the dining room and a zoning variance allowing the project to exceed the maximum height for its kitchen scrubber installation were presented to the Landmarks Preservation Commission during its Dec. 20 meeting.
After a quick hearing, commissioners voted unanimously to approve modifications and the zoning variance, with some lauding the design team’s effort.
“I think it’s a beautiful project. I’m ready to go there for dinner, tonight,” said Chair Sue Patterson. “It’s fabulous that we’ll have a restaurant on the water.”
A week earlier, representatives for Southampton, New York-based Tutto Il Giorno Restaurant Group, stood before the Town Council’s development review meeting.
It was a crucial hearing for the project, since the council was voting on special exceptions required to open a restaurant, for waterfront outdoor café seating, and for the zoning variance.
Designer Dominic Kozerski, founding partner at Bonetti/Kozerski Architecture, led the presentation on the 8,390-square-foot Mediterranean concept that will take over the location that once housed the famed John Volk-designed Celebrity Room.
The location’s iconic former bar was not lost on designers, with Kozerski emphasizing Tutto Mare’s tribute to the Celebrity Room via its atmosphere and design. “For us, it’s an amazing experience to take on something with such a great local lore,” he said. “And it very much informed the way we approached the design.”
In step with this goal, Kozerski presented the interior design of the future restaurant’s bar and lounge, featuring the Celebrity Room’s famed trompe l’oeil mural the “Venetian Festival” serving as centerpiece to the room.
The mural, commissioned by Volk and the theater’s original owner Frank J. Hale, depicts 125 actors, celebrities, and well-known locals, including Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Lilly Pulitzer and Volk.
“As we started to work on the design, we wanted to make sure that everything was working with that trompe l’oeil perspective on the ceiling,” Kozerski said.
Bathed in warm wood tones, the 64-seat lounge and bar room will feature a centerpiece reminiscent of a luxurious living room surrounded by wine-red upholstered booths with plants and various artisanal artifacts, courtesy of Tutto Il Giorno Group co-founder Gabby Karan de Felice, detailing the surroundings.
“It feels like a very elevated but neighborhood place … there is this home feeling we are trying to get there,” Kozerski said.
West of the lounge will be the 72-seat main dining room, which continues the warm tones with wicker seats surrounding white clothed tables under a wood beam and cloth-covered roof that transitions to the outdoor terrace’s awning.
“Think of this terrace as an extension of the dining room inside … You’ll have this seamless (transition) from inside to out,” said Kozerski.
Following Kozerski was project architect Nelo Freijomal, of Spina O’Rourke + Partners, who presented the elevation models alongside the variance requiring the kitchen scrubber, as well as other minor modifications made to the style and placement of the exterior doors.
Council members praised the design and the waterfront terrace dining, though President Margaret Zeidman and council member Lew Crampton asked whether residents at the Palm Beach Towers Condominium were aware and supportive of the project.
According to Samantha David, president of WS Development, the firm leading the Royal Poinciana Playhouse reconstruction, the project leads had received words of support from the building manager and the president of the condominium board.
The council also worried about the restaurant becoming a nightlife location, with guests more interested in having a drink than enjoying a calm dining experience.
“Are you going to require outdoors is for dining? It’s not going to be a bar?” council member Bobby Lindsay asked.
James Crowley, attorney for the project, assured the council that the owners want the restaurant to cater to the calmer Palm Beach crowd, with no interest in Tutto Mare becoming a “party restaurant.”
Commissioners said they were especially concerned about the 64-seat terrace dining area.
“I would really like you to get a letter of support from the (Palm Beach Towers) HOA, because 64 is a lot to start with outside when you don’t know how the sound is going to carry,” Zeidman said.
Highlighting a noise study commissioned by the project, David said the estimated noise level for the restaurant at max capacity would be an estimated 49 decibels, well below the town’s limit of 64 decibels during the day and 58 decibels at night.
Council Member Julie Araskog remained unconvinced.
“When the sound (study) was done, did you have 64 people sitting there with the ambient noise?” Araskog said.
Crowley replied they did not, but that the study had a rigorous methodological approach to estimate the sound profile.
Araskog also questioned whether the restaurant would violate the Town’s Comprehensive Plan by becoming a regional destination, considering the restaurant’s alluring waterfront.
“I would like proof that (it will be) town-serving,” Araskog said.
Despite their concerns, council members voiced excitement for the restaurant.
“To tell you the truth, it’s the one thing that I think this town has lacked for many years, a beautiful waterfront ― lovely first-class restaurant,” said Mayor Danielle Moore.
Crampton praised the project’s appreciation for Palm Beach’s history.
“They have made a real effort to recreate something that was a beloved tradition in this town, the Celebrity Room,” Crampton said. “That’s an extra effort … the same kinds of interaction that took place in the Celebrity Room of old are likely to happen in this room as well.”
Karan de Felice gave a final remark thanking the town for the opportunity to join the Palm Beach community.
“It’s very important for us to live where we work. It wasn’t always about creating a restaurant but being part of a community and giving back,” she said. “We want everyone to use this as their home, as it is our home.”
The council voted unanimously to approve the variance for the kitchen scrubber and the special exception to build a restaurant, and voted 4-1 to approve the special use tied to the outdoor café, with Araskog casting the nay vote. All were conditioned upon the approval of the restaurant’s declaration of use.
The project is set for the council’s Jan. 10 development review meeting, where discussion will center on finalizing the details of the eatery’s declaration of use.
Diego Diaz Lasa is a journalist at the Palm Beach Daily News, part of the USA TODAY Florida Network. You can reach him at dlasa@pbdailynews.com. Help support our journalism. Subscribe today.