Ariel Saban just won design approval for a new restaurant and event space in Wynwood on the site of a former ramshackle house he bought two years ago, amid continuing redevelopment in the hot Miami neighborhood.
The property at 158 Northwest 24th Street will be called the Saban Building, and will house an as-yet-unnamed Mediterranean restaurant owned by the restaurant group Wyn Bros, led by Marco Todoerti and Francesco Bossart, Saban told The Real Deal.
Former house at 158 Northwest 24th Street
Saban’s Saban Family Properties purchased the property for $995,000 in July 2015. At the time, attorney and developer Saban said he planned to renovate the tiny house and lease it to a national retailer or restaurant. But the foundation was rotted and the home turned out to be unsalvageable, he said.
The new design, approved by the Wynwood Design Review Committee, includes 1,000 square feet of interior space and more than 3,500 square feet of outdoor patio. The partially glass-enclosed building will have ceilings two-stories high and a second story garden on a portion of the building over the kitchen, with cut-outs in the roof to allow in the sunlight and rainwater. The building will also showcase art from local artists. Saban expects the investment to top $500,000.
Jose Gomez of Beilinson Gomez Architects designed the building. Construction is expected to begin by December, and will take about three months, said Saban, who, along with his family and Robert Solomon also owns the Saban + Solomon law office building at 400 Northeast 36th Street in Miami, and has developed properties in Fort Lauderdale.
On 24th Street in Wynwood, several other projects have recently been completed or are in the works. East End Capital built Wynwood Arcade, at 74 Northwest 24th Street, which has 20,000 square feet of retail and restaurants, including the Salty Donut. RedSky Capital is planning Cube Wynwyd, with 80,000 square feet of office space and about 11,400 square feet of retail space at 222 Northwest 24th Street.
And East End Capital and the Related Group are building Wynwood 25, a mixed-use project at 339 Northwest 24th Street, which will include 289 apartments, about 31,000 square feet of retail space and 340 parking spaces. Earlier this month, the developers won design approval for the Wynwood 25 Annex, a roughly 40,000-square-foot office building that will be built alongside the apartments.