The former Main restaurant might soon be brought back to life, this time with an inn upstairs.
The Greenport planning board met on Thursday night to discuss an application for a pre-submission conference with the new owner of Sterling Square, Brent Pelton, who intends to submit an application for site plan review for 300-308 Main Street, which will include rehabilitation of the second floor, used in the past as an office/storage space, into an inn.
Proposed floor plans would allow for five rooms in the inn. The property is located in the village’s commercial/retail district.
Main was formerly owned by chef Keith Luce, who shuttered all his Sterling Square businesses, including Meet, Prep and Nosh, abruptly last December.
Since then, the 1943 Pizza Bar has opened at the former Prep and Brix and Rye opened at the former Meet.
Pelton said he has a vision for the property. “I recently closed on Sterling Square, and I’m captivated by it,” he said Thursday night. “I love the property.” Pelton said he visited a few years ago for dinner and “fell in love with it.” After a year spent working on buying the property, Pelton said he’s happy to be a part of the North Fork, with its wineries, farms and open space. An inn and restaurant at the shuttered eatery would be economic engine for the village, he added.
Looking at the former Main, Pelton said he was looking for way to “diversify the income” on the property and found upstairs to be a vast, underutilized space. “It was a storage area where stuff went to die. It was scary. You didn’t know what was in there.”
Now, he has plans to add sprinklers to the building, and is proposing a “historically appropriate” restaurant and an inn upstairs featuring “five well-done rooms.”
With an eye toward being a “good neighbor,” Pelton has shown the plans to nearby business owners.
Planning board member Ben Burns asked what the term “inn” implies. Greenport Village Building Inspector Eileen Wingate said the inn would be monitored by the county; B&Bs, which are limited to three rooms, are monitored by the village.
Pelton said he plans to put in a new entrance, staircase, and small lobby space downstairs that would not significantly impact the restaurant. The dining room would also be spruced up, he said. A material that looks like clapboard could be used instead of the current stucco, he said.
So far, no plans have been made for a name for the business, or decisions on whether or not live entertainment would be offered. Pelton said as for the chef, he’s “looking for the right fit.”
Burns said he thought the plans could work creatively.
“It fits in very well with the zoning,” Wingate added.
Planning board member Chris Dowling said the business could bring people and foot traffic to upper Main Street, sometimes known as a “dead zone”.
The board voted to close the presubmission conference and Pelton said he and his architect would prepare the drawings, the next step.
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