The Pubbelly Boys are shuttering L'echon Brasserie today.
New Times learned of the closure in an email that contained the following brief statement:
As of July 1, 2015, "L'echon Brasserie", a French concept developed by The Pubbelly Restaurant Group, will no longer operate at the Hilton Cabana Hotel in Miami Beach, Florida. This departure is a result of the amicable end of the business relationship between The Pubbelly Restaurant Group and RLJ Cabana Miami Beach, the owner of the Hilton Cabana Hotel. This separation allows both sides to focus on exciting developments in both of their businesses.The brasserie opened almost exactly a year ago at the Hilton Cabana Hotel and was the first foray into hotel dining for the Pubbelly team of Jose Mendin, Sergio Navarro, and Andreas Schreiner. The 150 seat, 2,550 square foot bistro, a clever take on the Spanish word for pork, lechon, was also larger and more formal that the group's other restaurants Pubbelly, Pubbelly Sushi, and Barceloneta,
When it opened, the restaurant was realization of a long-time goal for the Pubbelly Boys, as they are lovingly referred to, with Andreas Schreiner telling Miami New Times, "We always wanted to do a French restaurant. It's kind of every chef's dream and the cuisine where everything kind of spawned from."
This is one in a series of ups and downs for the Miami-based restaurant group, which closed their PB Steak concept in July 2014, with plans to relocate it to Downtown Miami. A reworked version, PB Station, is set to open this fall at The Langford Hotel in Miami, along with a rooftop lounge called The Pawn Broker. More recently, Barceloneta in South Miami closed. The Pubbelly Group were involved in the initial concept development of the restaurant , but were not owners. They remain operating partners for Barceloneta South Beach.
Will L'echon turn up somewhere else in some other more intimate space? It's not out of the question, according to Pubbelly's PR rep, who simply said, "There might be a reincarnation of it, but nothing set in stone. The boys are very proud of the concept and so would be happy to see it live on." Miami New Times is reaching out to the Pubbelly Group for additional comments and will update the story when we hear more.
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