Russian restaurateurs bank on new Miami River dining spot

A new waterfront restaurant is in the works for the Miami River on the site of a marina across from Seaspice, The Real Deal has learned.

The as-yet-unnamed eatery is planned for the Anchor Marine property at 961 Northwest Seventh Street, Henry Greenberg, managing director of Longmore LLC, told TRD. Greenberg is part of a group called the Restaurant Syndicate that owns nine restaurants in Moscow. The Miami restaurant will be the group’s first in the United States. 

The restaurant’s site includes two buildings and a marina with nearly a dozen boat slips. Plans are to convert the main building into an 8,000-square-foot, 300-seat restaurant with a large outdoor terrace and covered boat slips, Greenberg said. His partner on the restaurant is Max Dyakov, based in Moscow.

“It is a modern aesthetic with an exposed industrial treatment on the interior….”  Omar Morales, founder and principal of Formgroup Architecture & Planning, who is the architect for the restaurant, told TRD. “It’s a very interesting sort of modern marine aesthetic.”

Greenberg said he expects to get permits soon, with hopes of opening in March. Chef Kris Wessel is consulting on the menu, which will emphasize seafood.

For the next phase, a second, two-story building will later be renovated into a supper club and lounge or nightclub, with a helipad on top. Overall, Greenberg said the project represents an investment of more than $3 million.

The 20,750-square-foot property is owned by Babba Joshua Yesharim, who said he has assembled 250,000 square feet of properties along and near the Miami River. Records show he bought the 961 Northwest Seventh Street property for $1.535 million in June 2013. He also owns the properties leased by restaurants Seaspice and Crust.

“Since 2013 I’ve been showing it to a multitude of people in the restaurant and nightclub industry….” Yesharim told TRD of the new restaurant’s site. “A lot of people looked at it and it needed a considerable amount of build-out. Henry and his group, the Russians, are the only ones that had the guts to make it into something glorious.”

Yesharim, president of Riverside District Development, said his holdings also include the block between 300 and 370 Northwest Eighth Avenue, which was historically a bar and nightclub. The property is now available for lease, and he has branded it as the Riverside District. “Our main focus,” he said, “is to get restaurants there.”

The Miami River is spilling over with an influx of new projects, including new restaurants, retail, offices and residential developments. River Yacht Club, a restaurant and boat marina at 401 Southwest Third Avenue, owned and developed by the Chetrit Group and Dupoux Partners, opened earlier this year.

In June, Shahab Karmely and Alex von Furstenberg paid $5.4 million for the River Arts Building at 131 Northwest South River Drive on the Miami River, with plans to launch a new restaurant with entertainment and event space. The property, on the south side of the river and across from Lummus Park, is less than a mile away from Karmely’s planned One River Point, a 60-story luxury condominium designed by architect Rafael Viñoly that will be built along the Miami River.

In addition to One River Point, Chetrit Group, Ari Pearl and JDS Development Group are planning to build a mixed-used project that includes four towers, a hotel, shops, restaurants, and a public river walk with boat slips.