“I had to rip everything out – all the seats, the booths, everything had to go,” he said. I’m hoping to open it and still have it be the Blue Danube, but a lot cleaner, a lot nicer.”Īccording to Cataland, the interior of the restaurant had to be gutted, partially due to a leaking roof that created significant mold issues in the nearly five years the building sat vacant. ![]() “There have been several generations that have passed through here, and I always get inquiries, and people asking what’s going to happen to the place. ‘Oh, my mom and dad came here when they went to Ohio State, and I had to get a picture,’” said Cataland, who has lived down the street from the Dube for 60 years. ![]() “During the week, people will come by the Blue Danube and take selfies, and I always ask them what they’re doing. Cataland said he is working toward reopening the diner in the next three months, pending permit approval, and that he intends to keep the Blue Danube name in place but update the menu with “a Mediterranean twist." "We're going to have octopus and squid and all sorts of neat things we have in Greece," he said.Ĭataland said he was able to purchase the building from Margetis due in part to the shared history between the two families (Margetis partnered with Teri’s father, Max, to open the Aegean Supper Club on Parsons Avenue in the early 1970s), and that he has a deep respect for the what the business Margetis built meant to the neighboring community. The tiles were removed during extensive renovations currently being undertaken by Blue Danube owner Teri Cataland, who purchased the building from George Margetis last year. (Sukosd will also soon be reunited with the tile he painted alongside his wife the couple purchased the piece this week and plan to display it in their Maryland home.) The shop has since sold “20 or 30” of the artworks, she said, including a handful purchased by a longtime customer of the restaurant who intended to use the pieces as a means of introducing “a bit of Columbus history” into their Airbnb rental properties. The fact that it even still exists is amazing.”įresco Furnishings owner Anne Robinson said the store started to receive the tiles from the Dube – along with assorted light fixtures – beginning in December. ![]() "I can’t even say that I ever saw it in the restaurant. "My brother went to art school, and my wife loves to paint, but as you can tell by my, I have zero artistic ability," said Sukosd, who pegged the painting to the summer of 2002, since that was the year he graduated from Ohio State, and he painted himself wearing a cap and gown. While there, the trio stopped at a crafting booth and painted their self-portraits onto a single tile that was later installed in the ceiling at the Blue Danube – an iconic diner on the corner of Blake Avenue and North High Street in the Old North neighborhood that closed amid ownership squabbles in 2018.Īnd that was the last Sukosd thought of the painting until it turned up for sale recently on the website of Fresco Furnishings, a consignment shop on West Fifth Avenue in Grandview, listed alongside a dozen or so similarly wild tiles that were once part of a colorful mosaic covering the entire ceiling expanse within the Dube. More than two decades ago, Jacob Sukosd attended the Columbus Arts Festival with his then-girlfriend, Julie (the two are now married), and his brother.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |