Score one for the Detroit Shoreway area, and minus-one for downtown Cleveland.
One Walnut, the nationally acclaimed restaurant and longtime watering hole for Cleveland’s powerbrokers, is closing later this month. Owner Marlin Kaplan, who also operates the highly successful Luxe Kitchen and Lounge in the Gordon Square neighborhood, will shift even greater attention to the emerging West Side arts district when he opens a second restaurant a few blocks down the street from Luxe.
Kaplan has formed a partnership with restaurateur Rosita Kutkut to transform her recently shuttered spot La Boca, 5800 Detroit Road, into an upscale taqueria.
“My wife, Melissa, and I decided to close One Walnut after a lot of heartfelt thought,” Kaplan said. “Times have changed since we opened nearly 11 years ago.”
The couple’s move had long been under consideration, as a growing number of vacancies in neighboring office buildings steadily eroded the restaurant’s core customer base. Meanwhile, the air of dressy sophistication that characterized One Walnut and earned it the praise of publications such as Esquire and Gourmet seemed increasingly detached from the far more casual tone of modern dining — the very style that has drawn droves of dinner guests to Luxe.
“[One Walnut] had its heyday, and at a time when Cleveland didn’t have a lot going on in terms of restaurants,” says Kaplan. “It’s lasted 10 years; there aren’t a lot of restaurants downtown that can say that.”
Josh Taylor, a spokesman for the Downtown Cleveland Alliance, regrets the departure of a prestigious name on the city’s landscape. But he points to the recent opening of Chinato on East Fourth Street and the soon-to-debut Zinc around the corner on Euclid Avenue as indications of downtown’s continuing revitalization.
“That’s not to diminish Kaplan,” Taylor says. “And just because one opportunity closes doesn’t mean another won’t open. We hope he can be a part of downtown again in the near future.”
The restaurateur won’t be too far away — certainly not for fans of his cuisine. When the new spot, Roseangel, opens sometime in early July, they will find house-made margaritas, more than a dozen moderately priced tacos and a variety of a la carte menu items.
“It’s a good change, I think,” says Kutkut, who will lend her behind-scenes expertise. “This is the direction I’ve wanted to take, going smaller and making the corner even better.”
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