From a $5M investor feud to a closing institution and a coffee shop annexing King Street, the past month rewrote several chapters of Charleston's dining map.
Peninsula Grill is closing, Church and Union is fighting investors in court, and babas on meeting is absorbing Rodney Scott's King Street footprint — all in the span of a few weeks. Meanwhile, Two Blokes Brewing opened a downtown taproom, PURE Theatre staged a world premiere, and Poogan's Smokehouse is headed to Summerville. Here's everything worth knowing.
The Post & Courier confirmed what regulars had feared: Peninsula Grill is closing as the Planters Inn begins renovations, ending a nearly 30-year run at the upper end of Charleston's dining scene. Chef John Ondo — a Charleston native who once worked the line here before returning as executive chef — will close out what the paper calls one of the peninsula's last white-tablecloth holdouts.
Rodney Scott's BBQ will not return to 1011 King Street, and the new tenant is confirmed: babas on meeting has signed a lease on the address, per the Post & Courier, as Scott's co-founder Nick Pihakis separately filed for bankruptcy listing $44 million in debts. The Italian-leaning café's expansion into one of King Street's more prominent restaurant footprints is one to watch.
The Post & Courier reported that the restaurateur operating Church and Union near the City Market is embroiled in a legal and financial feud with investors alleging $5 million has been misappropriated — putting one of downtown Charleston's higher-profile dining rooms under genuine uncertainty. Worth knowing before you book a table or redeem a gift card.
Both Charleston City Paper and the Post & Courier confirmed Two Blokes Brewing opened its Cannon Street taproom on August 11, giving the downtown peninsula its newest production brewery. The City Paper ran a full feature; the Post & Courier noted the operators come with established local credentials.
Charleston City Paper reviewed PURE Theatre's world-premiere production, calling it "a searing sendup of Southern sanctimony" that exposes the hypocrisy behind performative piety — and lands its punches. World premieres at PURE's intimate downtown space don't repeat themselves; check the run dates.
Poogan's Southern Kitchen in Summerville's Nexton Square will close at the end of September for a full menu overhaul and emerge as Poogan's Smokehouse, per the Post & Courier — swapping the Southern fare format for a barbecue-focused concept. Last call for the current menu is imminent.
Charleston City Paper documented partner and cheesemonger Warren Johnson's nearly two-year search to land the specific olive he wanted for Saint Urban's martini program. The obsessive specificity is the point: the Mount Pleasant wine bar now has the most considered martini in the neighborhood, and Johnson will explain the olive if you ask.
Winslow Hastie announced his retirement after nine years leading Historic Charleston Foundation, per the Post & Courier — a tenure that coincided with the most intense development pressure the peninsula has faced in decades. The City Paper's editorial board cited both Hastie and Mayor Beasley as examples of principled local leadership. Who takes over will shape the city's next preservation fights.
The building at 280 Meeting Street housing Theatre 99 sold for nearly $7 million, with plans for six condominiums on the site, per a Post & Courier briefing. The improv institution's future at this address is now in a new owner's hands — the most consequential real-estate move in Charleston's small-theater world this year.