Hyde Park Restaurant Group Signs Lease on Gamekeeper’s Taverne Space in Chagrin Falls

Last spring, Gamekeeper's Taverne closed its doors after 40 years in business. Today, we learned who will be the new stewards of that iconic Chagrin Falls property.

“We signed a lease on Gamekeeper’s Taverne and can now go forward,” says Joe Saccone of Hyde Park Restaurant Group. “We’re really just getting our hands around it now.”

In addition to nearly a dozen Hyde Park Prime Steakhouses scattered around the Midwest and Florida, Hyde Park Restaurant Group operates the nearby Jekyll's Kitchen as well as ML Tavern in Moreland Hills.

Already, the building’s owners have invested in a new roof and windows, notes Saccone, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg in terms of planned improvements that he is calling “a major facelift.”

“We expect to spend a substantial amount of dollars upgrading the facility while keeping a lot of the charm of the space,” he explains.

In addition to the new interior, and major remodels of the kitchen and restrooms, Saccone hopes to extend the small bar in the front of the building out onto a front-side patio.

When it opens in late spring or early summer, the restaurant will be a new brand for the restaurant group. While still in the conceptual phase, there is a frontrunner in terms of concepts.

“The top idea for us is, we’re steakhouse guys, so it could be a chef-inspired steakhouse with a lot of European influences,” Saccone acknowledges.

There were many suitors for the prime Chagrin Falls property, but at the end of the day, it was Saccone and Hyde Park who walked away with the prize. It’s an honor and privilege he doesn’t intend to squander.

“It’s an iconic spot, the patio is fantastic, and we know what the Village has meant to Cleveland and the eastern suburbs,” Saccone says. “It was very sad to see Gamekeeper’s go. [Owner] Tom [Lutz] and I were competitors, but we both worked in the Village and tried to make the Village great. It’s an opportunity for us, and hopefully what we do will complement everybody in the Village and bring more people down there.”