New Restaurant Petitions Wellesley For New Rules Regarding Bar Seats And Wins

WELLESLEY, MA — There's an upscale steak house slated to open where Blue Ginger once sat. There was just one hitch in the way until Monday night when the CEO of Smith & Wollensky petitioned the Town of Wellesley to modify rules around bar seating at restaurants that serve booze. And he succeeded.

Until Monday there was a cap of 10 bar seating per establishment, according to the rules governing the operation of businesses that sell alcohol. That means a restaurant with 50 seats could have five bar stools. A restaurant with 100 or more seats could have 10 bar stools. But that's where it stops.

Enter Smith & Wollensky's.

The fancy, beef-centric restaurant (known for it's locations in Back Bay, Atlantic Wharf, and in New York, Chicago and London) argued that there's a change in dining establishment design and the increase in single diners so they hired a lawyer, Wellesley's David Himmelberger, and proposed modifying the regulations. The new regulations would continue to limit the number of bar seats to 10 percent of the number of interior seats within the establishment, but would do away with the cap.

"We're not a bar, we're a restaurant and steakhouse that provides that service. What we've seen in the last eight to 10 years... is that this [style] has become a hub of dining. People do intend to dine out way more frequently than they did before. We don't encourage late night drinking. Our price point doesn't allow for that," said President and CEO of Smith & Wollensky Michael Feighery.

Its the fancy steakhouse's first suburban Massachusetts location, and they plan to open early next year.

"It's the first time in 40 years we will open a restaurant in a non downtown area," he said. "When we found this location it was the first one that really ticked all the boxes."

Blue Ginger, owned by Ming Tsai closed in June.

(Editor's Note: this article has been updated with the correct spelling of Smith&Wollensky)

Photo by Jenna Fisher/Patch