The mostly deserted parking lot at the School Street Bistro may prepare any arriving customers for the sign they will find on the door which reads “Temporarily Closed 11/27/2012”. (Photo by Carl E. Hartdegen)
WESTFIELD – One of the city’s fine dining destinations closed abruptly Tuesday when signs appeared on the doors of the School Street Bistro which read “Temporarily Closed 11/27/2012.”
The restaurant has offered genteel dining in the city for almost 15 years and has also hosted special functions and meetings in two banquet halls on the upper floors of the historic building on School Street.
The city’s Rotarians, who adopted the restaurant as their home for their weekly meetings, were notified Tuesday (the restaurant has not been open on Mondays) that the restaurant would not be available for their meeting that night and club president Robert Herrick informed the members that the restaurant owner, John Loveland, told him that the Bistro would be closing “for the remainder of the year.”
Loveland, together with his partner, Robert Keehn, purchased the restaurant after operating a similar styled restaurant in Quakertown, Penn., for 14 years.
The restaurant had been established in 1997 by local developer Ralph DePalma and operated by his brother, chef Nicholas DePalma. The brothers owned the restaurant jointly with John Jeserski and sold it to Loveland and Keehn in July, 2008.
At the time, Ralph DePalma said that the purchase price was in the $800,000 range.
The restaurant’s web site was operational on Wednesday but makes no reference to the closing.
However, sales of gift certificates have apparently been halted as clicking on the gift certificate button leads to a page which reads “Please check back soon.”
The entertainment page lists no musical events after Nov. 17.
The recording on the restaurant’s telephone answering machine appears to be unchanged as it claims that the restaurant is “open for dinner Tuesday through Saturday.”
Among the events which had been scheduled for the restaurant during the holiday season are two performances of ‘A Christmas Carol’ preceded by a ‘Dickens Dinner’.
The events, scheduled for Thursday, Dec. 13, and Saturday, Dec. 15, have been relocated to Shaker Farms Country Club.
