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Seaport to get a locally owned music spot/restaurant with Southern cuisine
By adamg on Wed, 03/08/2023 - 2:32pm
The Boston Licensing Board today approved plans by Darryl's Corner Bar owner Nia Grace to open what her attorney called "a supper club and speakeasy with a full menu" in the Seaport Square complex.
Grace will buy the liquor license of the defunct Seaport Square Showcase Cinema for her 166-seat Grace by Nia's. For part of the night, Grace by Nia's will be a restaurant serving "Southern-inspired cuisine" and "a Southern take" on New England fare before the tables and seats are reconfigured to allow for jazz, R&B and soul performances up until 2 a.m., her attorney, Lesley Delaney Hawkins, told the board. Grace will also serve brunch on weekends.
Board Chairwoman Kathleen Joyce praised the "very exciting application" in a neighborhood where large restaurants tend to be owned by national chains.
Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, a Texas-based theater chain, plans to move into the old Showcase space, but it's gaining the right to serve its customers alcohol by buying the license of the former Canary Square restaurant in Jamaica Plain. Liquor-license musical chairs like this happen due to the cap on liquor licenses imposed on Boston by the state legislature.
In addition to the Seaport, Grace is working with partners to open a 200-seat performance space and restaurant in Nubian Square. The Zoning Board of Appeal approved plans for the Jazz Urbane Cafe in the Bolling Building in December - the same month the legislature approved new liquor licenses for Boston specifically for the Bolling Building and the Strand Theatre in Dorchester.
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Comments
I am so tired
"a supper club and speakeasy with a full menu"
...a restaurant with full bar. You're in the seaport for gods sake not some 1920s crime underworld.
I'm fine with it
There's a whole lot of plusses to this application. If this is her theme, more power to her. Boston desperately needs more places like her proposal. Godspeed.
Godspeed this speakeasy
and Lord bless our house of ill repute. May God grant his protection to our criminal enterprise. God knows it's the only protection we can afford, since the Dutchman raised his rates.
Not the 1920s gangland you expect…
To be clear - a supper club is a social destination that focuses on the retreating effects of leisurely dining paired with an exciting entertainment element. No, this definitely isn’t a 1920s crime mob throwback - but it is a renaissance celebration of the value of time, community, and gathering for pure enjoyment and connection - it’s a celebration of humanity over a family style meal paired with local entertainment. If you’d like to simply ‘dine and drink’ at a restaurant and bar, please do. If you’re looking for a full experience evening of inventive fare, limit pushing cocktails, and artfully curated entertainment - join us at Grace By Nia - cheers!
Okay but how fun would it be
Okay but how fun would it be if there's like Gatsby nights where everybody wears their gangster gear and flapper dresses. Maybe people can just have fun for once, you ever think of that?
What does this mean Adam?
“Alamo Drafthouse Cinema, a Texas-based theater chain, plans to move into the old Showcase space, but it's gaining the right to serve its customers alcohol by approved plans for the Jazz Urbane Cafe in the Bolling Building in December“
Is everything okay with Jazz Urbane?
It means I shouldn't be allowed near HTML
I screwed up a link, so it made a big chunk of text disappear. Sorry, fixed now. Alamo and the Jazz Urbane have nothing to do with each other.
Does "southern inspired" mean
Yet another local establishment with no concept of pulled pork, which can only be served in a vinegar based sauce as opposed to the thick, tasteless store bought barbecue sauce?
And you better have banana pudding with nilla wafers... that's a warning
Vinegar based BBQ
That’s the only way to go!
You know that there's more to
You know that there's more to southern cooking than barbeque, right?
IKR, for damn sake, there are biscuits!
IKR, for damn sake, there are biscuits!
You know she already runs a restaurant, right?
Seems like you could take a look at that menu (or better yet, stop by for dinner! It's delicious!) to get a sense of what kind of food this place might have.
now people can fly into Logan for conventions
and spend all their time in the Seaport, having no inkling whether or not they were ever in Boston.
Yeah dude
The woman should have instead opened a oyster and NE clam chowder restaurant complete with a band that plays nothing but sea shanties and the occasional Drop Kick Murphy's cover. The servers throw in lines from The Departed and Good Will Hunting while reading you a list of draft beers (Nothing but Sam Adams) in their best over-the-top exaggerated accent.
This way everyone can go home claiming they had a true Boston experience.
/S
It literally says a southern
It literally says a southern take on new england fare. Weird racial undertone to the implication that a Roxbury native and woman who has been deeply involved in her Boston community, can't provide a "Boston" experience by doing a personal take on the traditional foods from the area.