Months after a large fire leveled the restaurant, Marco Polo still stands as a burnt out husk on Maple Avenue.
The building had been long vacant and was set to be demolished, even before two teens allegedly set fire to the building as part of a small crime spree.
The site is owned by a limited-liability corporation, Vienna Vision LLC, and was planned to be redeveloped as 8,200 square feet of retail space and 44 townhouse condominiums. The development was approved in 2017.
Town of Vienna staff say a letter has been sent out to representatives of the property’s owners with questions regarding the property and condition, urging them to do something about the building’s “blighted condition.”
After Vienna staff sent a letter requiring action within 30 days, Doug D’Alexander, the property’s developer, applied for a demolition permit on Dec. 16. Additional information about the demolition was requested and no response has been offered by D’Alexander.
Tysons Reporter attempted to contact D’Alexander but has not received any response.
“As part of the development process, the site plan was approved in early December,” said Lynne Coan, communications and marketing manager for the Town of Vienna. “Next steps as part of the [Maple Avenue Commercial] process would be for the project to go before the Board of Architectural Review and for the developer to apply for building permits.”
If no progress is made, the town government could move forward with blight proceedings, where the town would demolish the building and charge the expenses to the property owner.
Blend 111 is shaping up to be a little different than many restaurants in Vienna.
It isn’t the latest branch of some regional or national chain. Instead, Blend 111 is a food and wine bar for Vienna by local Vienna residents.
Signs are up on the front of the restaurant under construction at 111 Church St., but there’s still a lot of work still to do inside before it’s ready for its first customers. Michael Biddick, principal owner and CEO of Blend 111, says construction will start the first week of January and is scheduled to take 8-12 weeks with an opening in mid-spring 2019.
But when it does open, Biddick says the restaurant will be a blend of the taste and regional dishes of the four different Vienna families coming together to support the project.
“We wanted to bring something you normally find around D.C. or Logan Circle, an upscale restaurant experience that’s accessible for the community,” said Biddick. “We wanted a special place to go on a night out.”
Biddick said the idea for the restaurant came as he was commiserating with neighbors that they all loved going into the city, but with kids and jobs with long hours it was difficult to make the hour drive and get a babysitter.
“A lot of people around here just go somewhere else, like a chain or somewhere in town, but they make do with convenience,” said Biddick. “We wanted to give people a great restaurant to go to for wine and a special night right here in Vienna.”
Around April, Biddick said he sold the last of the tech startups he’d been working on and had extra time on his hands. Wine and food was a hobby for Biddick and he began to take a serious interest in turning that into a local business.
“I started on my own, but as we shared that with neighbors they got really interested and wanted to come in on the project,” said Biddick. “So now there are four families in Vienna investing… They’re mainly neighbors, just people on the street who want to be involved.”
The restaurant will offer a blend of cuisines from Venezuela, France and Spain, three culinary cultures Biddick says were important to the families involved.
“We took those three regions and tried to create some menu concepts off the things we saw when we were traveling,” said Biddick. “Like we really loved this menu dish from Spain, so we made a note to bring that back with us.”
While there are options for meat eaters like grilled quail or duck, Biddick, a vegetarian, said he was also mindful to offer equal portions of vegan, vegetarian, and gluten-free options in the menu.
The restaurant’s origins come from a community need, and Biddick says he aims for that community focus to continue after the restaurant opens. The types of food served and hours the restaurant runs are all planned to be flexible based on what the community responds to.
“The localness of Vienna, and the lack of a lot of the larger restaurant chain environments directly in downtown Vienna, makes it unique,” said Biddick. “I think this is showing that you can do something unique and super high quality that isn’t part of some big chain. That’s something that’s important for us to prove.”
Photos via Twitter
The sign above the store still says Falafel Street, but there’s chicken coming to 235 Maple Ave E. in Vienna.
Banners placed on either side of the storefront’s door say that a restaurant called Keiko Charcoal Chicken is “coming soon.”
Falafel Street, a Mediterranean restaurant whose sign is overhead, closed earlier this year, according to its Yelp page. Despite the banners in the window, Keiko Charcoal Chicken does not seem to have any identifiable online presence yet.
Keiko isn’t the only establishment coming to this stretch of Maple Avenue. Across the street, Shin Se Kai Ramen is also “coming soon” to 234 Maple Ave E.
Hat tip to “Vienna J”
After an “unexpected delay,” the Virginia Tire and Auto state at 141 Maple Ave in Vienna is scheduled to open early next year.
The Virginia Tire and Auto was originally scheduled to open in October, but a delay pushed the grand opening back. An employee at Virginia Tire and Auto confirmed that the new opening was scheduled for early January but could not comment on what had caused the delay.
The dealership has been expanding recently, with two new locations opening in Richmond and Herndon. The new locations will bring the total number of dealership locations to 16.
The location had previously operated for 30 years as Merchant’s Tire & Auto Center, but had been renovated with new equipment like new in-ground lifts. The Vienna Virginia Tire and Auto will have nine bays available for mechanical work.
The new Virginia Tire and Auto is near the center of Maple Avenue, located between the newly opened Nothing Bundt Cakes and Maple Ave Restaurant, recently featured as one of Northern Virginia’s Top 50 restaurants.
The Vienna Shopping Center, already a popular local lunch destination with fast-casual spots like Cava and Mod Pizza, is about to add Don Pollo to the local casual food offerings.
The charbroiled chicken eatery is scheduled to open at 146 Maple Ave. W sometime in December, according to its website. The Vienna location will be the sixth for the chain and the first outside of Maryland.
Don Pollo features Peruvian cuisine, from its namesake chicken dishes to steak and seafood. Sides include South American staples like yuca and chaufa (Peruvian fried rice).
A new Ben & Jerry’s also opened in the Vienna Shopping Center on Sept. 21.
Hat tip to “Vienna J.”
Vienna and Fairfax County Police have arrested two teen boys and charged them with a series of crimes, including setting fire to the Marco Polo restaurant.
One of the teens is a 14-year-old Vienna resident; the other is a 13-year-old Reston resident, according to police.
The boys are being charged with both felony and misdemeanor crimes, including arson. Police say other charges are being filed in relation to a Nov. 4 vandalism of two historic government-owned buildings near Lahey Lost Valley Park, which caused several thousand dollars in damage.
The Oct. 14 fire destroyed most of the Marco Polo building, which had been vacant. There were no injuries. The site is planned to be redeveloped as a retail and townhouse complex.
The teens are also charged with the vandalism of several buses in the rear parking lot of the restaurant on Sept. 9.
The pair is being held in the Fairfax County Juvenile Detention Center.
Anyone with additional information about the case is asked to contact Officer Juan Vazquez at [email protected] or 703-255-7845.
Nothing Bundt Cakes, a franchise specializing in the eponymous circular bundt cakes, is now open in downtown Vienna at 129 Maple Avenue W.
Marge Kelly, one of the co-owners of the store along with her husband, sister, and sister’s husband, said the shop officially opened last week and was immediately inundated with holiday orders.
“It’s been great,” said Kelly. “We were really busy right before Thanksgiving, but it’s been more manageable over the last few days.”
In addition to ten cake flavors and forty unique designs, Nothing Bundt Cakes also offers various cake-themed gifts and decor.
Kelly said the store was originally planning on having a grand opening celebration sometime in the next month but decided to push the grand opening celebration back to January.
Nothing Bundt Cakes is one of several new venues filling vacant storefronts along Maple Avenue this fall.
Interior photos via Facebook
Maple Avenue can be famously slow to change, and it’s left Vienna with rampant vacancies in the middle of a region seeing a surge of new development.
But aerial photography shows this hasn’t always been the case. Throughout the last 65 years, Maple Avenue has undergone a radical transformation.
Critics of a new four-story Maple Avenue development said too much was changing in Vienna too quickly, but at least from the air, the only 20-year period where there’s been very little change along Maple Avenue was between 1997 and 2017.
The Maple Avenue of 1953 looked quite different than the Maple Avenue of 1976. Maple Avenue transformed from a handful of small properties surrounded by farmland into islands of commercial property surrounded by residential streets.
Between 1976 and 1997, the gaps between those islands of commercial property had become filled in with smaller stores.
But the 1997 Maple Avenue is virtually identical to the 2017 Maple Avenue.
One of the most high-profile developments in downtown Vienna’s recent history was the establishment of the Town Green and redevelopment along Church Street, which runs parallel to Maple Street. The changes made there were cited by Vienna Town Council members during hearings for the controversial development — which was ultimately approved — as examples of ways development can still fit with a small town feeling.
Past and Present is a Tysons Reporter series looking at locations in our area as they’ve changed over the last century. Check out our articles for Tysons Corner Mall and Tysons Galleria/Leesburg Pike
Ten restaurants around the Tysons area made it onto this year’s Northern Virginia Magazine Top 50 Best Restaurants list, including five of the list’s top 10.
At the number three spot in the list is Maple Ave Restaurant at 147 Maple Ave W, just a few blocks west of the Vienna Town Green. It’s a small restaurant, but inside it’s an eclectic mix of American and European cuisine. The restaurant is open seven days a week for dinner, with lunch available on weekdays and brunch on Saturdays and Sundays.
At the eastern end of Maple Avenue is Clarity, which comes in at number five on the list. Clarity offers a seasonally rotating menu of modern American cuisine. A nightly “tasting menu” offers a guided tour of the restaurant’s cuisine. Tonight (Thursday), it’s a three-course meal a variety of seafood and roasted duck, accompanied by Suntory Japanese Whisky and followed by a chocolate almond torte.
But Vienna doesn’t take all the culinary credit for the region. At number seven on the list is Asian Origin, a Chinese restaurant just west of Tysons Galleria at 753 Pinnacle Dr. The restaurant serves a mix of traditional Chinese dishes as well as pan-Asian cuisine like sushi. Asian Origin also boasts a variety of vegetarian dishes.
At number nine is 2941, the modern American restaurant in Falls Church (2941 Fairview Park Dr) near Merrifield. The restaurant puts a French spin on classic American dishes, like a Bordelaise sauce on a rib eye steak.
Lastly, Esaan near downtown McLean (1307 Old Chain Bridge Rd) comes in at number ten on the list. Esaan is a Thai restaurant that offers a variety of specialty items and “street style” dishes from the northeastern region of the country. There’s none of the usual Pad Thai, but offerings like the spicy papaya salad offer a more unique Thai experience.
Also included on the Top 50 list are:
- Amoo’s Restaurant (6271 Old Dominion Dr) – A Persian restaurant in McLean
- Assaggi Osteria + Assagia Pizzeria (6641 Old Dominion Dr) – An Italian restaurant with a focus on fish and pasta in McLean
- Elephant Jumps (8110 Arlington Blvd) – A Thai restaurant in Merrifield
- Nostos (8100 Boone Blvd) – A Greek restaurant in Vienna
- Tachibana (6715 Lowell Ave) – A Japanese restaurant in McLean
There’s activity in the shuttered Rite Aid at 215 Maple Ave. in Vienna as workers transform the former pharmacy space into a Dollar Tree.
Dollar Tree is a discount store that has been thriving and expanding despite e-commerce outlets like Amazon devastating other retail chains. When the new Vienna store will open is unclear, but today workers were busy renovating the building’s interior.
A pair of folders were taped to the front door for those seeking employment to pick up and drop off applications.
The new store will fill a vacancy at an end of Maple Avenue badly in need of more commercial activity. A few feet west of the new Dollar Tree is the charred husk of the Marco Polo restaurant, which was destroyed in a fire last month, and the A.J.’s Sports Stop, which is likely to be closed within a year.
There are other signs of new life and development at the west end of Maple Avenue. Just two blocks away is the Wolf Trap Hotel, which earlier this week was authorized by the Vienna Town Council to be converted into a new four-story mixed-use development.
Hat tip to Laura Schwartz
