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The local Fess Parker hospitality empire begins a new chapter Monday with the opening of The Bear and Star restaurant in Los Olivos.
Spearheaded by Eli and Ashley Parker and chef partner John Cox, the 2860 Grand Ave. establishment will feature “refined ranch cuisine” under a ranch-to-kitchen model where much of the food is grown on the Parker family’s 700-acre ranch nearby.
Its Wagyu cattle — the menu’s hallmark ingredient — are fed with spent grain from the family’s brewery and winery.
“One thing that really stood out to me on this project is that there isn’t a better place to do year-round food and animal growing than the Santa Ynez Valley and Santa Barbara,” said Cox, who grew up in Fess Parker’s home state of Texas watching the pioneer characters the actor played in old films.
Though the Parkers have a country inn, winery and cattle ranch, “what they didn’t have was a way to showcase all those products” together, Cox said.
The Bear and Star takes over the former home of Petros, a Greek and Californian restaurant with locations in Santa Barbara, Solvang, El Segundo and Manhattan Beach.
Cox said he wanted the incoming restaurant to be more intimate than its predecessor, and feature a greater variety of experiences.
Thus, The Bear and Star features a dining room that can seat just under 40 people, a bar area for 30 to 35 patrons, a chef’s room and a wine room.
The latter features floor-to-ceiling wine racks in a temperature-controlled room where wineries can host private tastings.
The chef’s room is home to Cox’s library of cookbooks and can serve as a private event space or a cooking class for more “over the top” dishes than what are offered on the regular menu.
“It’ll evolve into a place where we do things that are a little more cerebral, a little more artistically culinary, and focus a little more on the fine details of the plating,” he said of the classes he plans to kick off in July.
All of these features, he said, added up to a “once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to do something unique.”
Impact Hub opens in the Funk Zone
Less than a year after opening at 1117 State St., Impact Hub now has a second Santa Barbara location at 10 E. Yanonali St. in the Funk Zone.
“We weren’t looking to expand that fast, but the space popped up and we took the opportunity,” said Dan Ferrick, Impact Hub Santa Barbara’s director and co-founder.
The establishment, which opened earlier this month, features meeting spaces and offices where people and organizations can rent out rooms, offices and desks via a monthly membership fee. It also hosts community events and workshops.
Location No. 2 features the same amenities, Ferrick said, but under a different layout.
Since opening last summer, he added, the State Street location has been home to startups, entrepreneurs, mature businesses and individuals just looking for a place outside their home office or a coffee shop to get their work done.
An opening party is tentatively planned for later in the spring when Satellite Santa Barbara, the State Street location’s upcoming bar and restaurant, debuts.
Impact Hub was founded in Europe and maintains locations around the world, including in Los Angeles, San Francisco, Oakland and Berkeley.
The Santa Barbara locations aren’t franchises, but were founded separately as part of the greater Impact Hub network and are allowed to use the organization’s name and branding.
Pacific Crêpes introduces Part Deux
More French cuisine and wine are now available at Santa Barbara’s Pacific Crêpes.
Owner Yvan Morin is collaborating with restaurant-industry veteran Ashley Pierce for Part Deux, the 20-year-old creperie’s evening concept that kicked off last week.
“With Part Deux, we hope to bring Santa Barbara a new spot to drink good wine and eat good food, all in good company,” Pierce announced.
Pacific Crêpes is open daily from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and Part Deux is open Thursday, Friday and Saturday from 5:30 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. — both at 705 Anacapa St.
18,000-square-foot office building sold in Carpinteria
The same day Part Deux opened, Hayes Commercial Group announced that it had brokered the purchase of an 18,000-square-foot office building at 1155 Eugenia Place in Carpinteria.
The property was listed for $6.5 million and sold to an investor. The entire 1.14-acre lot is leased to AGIA Affinity Services.
A recently released report by Hayes on South Coast commercial real estate sales for the first three months of the year found Carpinteria’s office space vacancy rate to be 3 percent, which company partner Greg Bartholomew, who brokered the deal, called “very low.”
That’s still 3-percent higher, however, than the city’s industrial space vacancy rate. Retail space vacancy rates sat at 4.4 percent, Hayes reported.
At last week’s Carpinteria State of the Community luncheon, Mark Schniepp, the director of the California Economic Forecast, revealed that only 27,000 square feet of the city’s 1.8 million square feet of industrial and office space is available.
— Noozhawk staff writer Sam Goldman can be reached at sgoldman@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.