(Above) Seating area and bar at Legal Sea Foods, a restaurant that will open at Marina City in July. The staircase at left leads to an oyster bar on Marina City’s plaza level. (Click on image to view larger version.)

By Steven Dahlman

27-Jun-24 – With a month left before Legal Sea Foods opens its first restaurant in Chicago, construction is winding down on both levels of its space at Marina City.

The seafood restaurant expects to open in late July in 10,000 square feet of space previously occupied by Dick’s Last Resort, plus a smaller space directly above it that used to be a Subway fast-food restaurant.

That upper level will soon be an oyster bar, connected by staircase and elevator to the main restaurant. Between the main dining room, private event spaces, oyster bar, and outdoor seating, there will be accommodation for 270 guests.

(Above left) Legal Sea Food’s oyster bar on the plaza level of Marina City on June 26. (Above right) The same space on May 23, 2010, when it was a soon-to-open Subway restaurant. (Click on image to view larger version.)

Legal Sea Foods describes the restaurant interior, designed by Phase Zero Design and constructed by the Chicago-based architecture firm NORR, as having “a modern, bright eastern seaboard feel.”

The 70-year-old company operates 26 restaurants, mostly along the East Coast.

Their parent company, PPX Hospitality Brands, also owns Smith & Wollensky, a chain of steakhouses, one of which is also located at Marina City. In 2020, Legal Sea Foods quietly set up a “virtual kitchen” at the Smith & Wollensky in Chicago. Offering food for pickup and delivery, the kitchen, said PBX Hospitality Brands, helped “test the waters” in Chicago for its New England-style seafood.

It was around that time, during the COVID-19 pandemic, that Dick’s Last Resort closed at Marina City, and PPX became interested in leasing the space for its Legal Sea Foods.

“It was an opportunity to plant a flag in the Midwest,” said Oliver Munday, CEO of PPX Hospitality Brands. PPX ended up signing a long-term lease for Legal Sea Foods on the Dearborn Street side of Marina City and renewing its long-term lease for Smith & Wollensky on the State Street side.

But will a restaurant promising “upscale casual New England vibes” succeed in Chicago?

“It’s dangerous when you are a concept from a certain city, and you go to other cities,” said Munday (left) in Chicago on Wednesday. “Some of those cities reject you, but you persevere.” Munday says the climate for opening a new restaurant in Chicago is “absolutely fine.”

“We’ve gone through the post-COVID sort of revenge dining where all this money was built up,” he said. “People had money in their accounts because they hadn’t been able to spend it. So, people hit the ground running.”

He says it is now more of a normal environment, though people working from home have changed their weekly patterns of dining out.

“Maybe Friday night is now Thursday night and Sunday night is now Tuesday night, so you have to adapt to that. But essentially, people love to go out with friends and family, and they love to have a dining experience. And people love seafood. We think in the Midwest that will really, really resonate.”

Munday says they were drawn to Chicago’s size and success as a tourist destination, and specifically to the Marina City complex, built in the 1960s and declared an official City of Chicago landmark in 2016.

“This is such a fascinating property,” said Munday, though adding it is “a very complicated building to manage and look after.”

“It’s a historic, architecturally significant building, so there’s all sorts of rules and regulations that you must respect,” he said. “But by the same token, we totally understand that, because this is a complex of incredibly prestigious architectural heritage. It’s a one of a kind.”

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