Eat My Florida

South Tampa’s St. Bart’s and Chateau Prive closed down on July 13. The restaurant was formerly owned by Ceviche’s Gordon Davis, but was taken over in 2005 by Ocala businessman Phillip Glassman, who had plans to turn the restaurant and adjoining building into an exclusive private club. With membership fees quoted at $5,000 per year, the price always seemed a little steep to residents, and the club turned out to be a tough sell.

Although the closure isn’t a surprise to many SoHo natives, it was abrupt. “They came in the middle of the night and cleaned the place out,” said Davis, who maintained ownership of the building. “Fixtures removed from the walls and everything. It’s crummy. Nasty. We’re in our second day of clean-up.”

Davis doesn’t have immediate plans for the 11,000-square-foot property. “I don’t think I’m going to re-open St. Barts,” he said, adding that he has met with his partners to bounce around ideas. “We’ve always wanted a larger Ceviche.”

Davis and his fellow Ceviche owners have their tapas plates in a lot of fires, with a huge remodel of an historic building in Sarasota and a newly announced space in Orlando’s Church Street Station scheduled to open as soon as October. “It’ll be the largest tapas bar in the country,” he said, “over 20,000 square feet.”

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