The Eagles are retaining running backs coach/assistant head coach Jemal Singleton and wide receivers coach Aaron Moorehead, NFL sources told The Inquirer on Tuesday. While coach Nick Sirianni has already made significant changes to his offensive staff, led by hiring Mannion last month, the return of two key members of his staff suggests a relative blending of the old and new.
Mannion, a first-time coordinator, is expected to bring with him some elements of the Kyle Shanahan-Sean McVay scheme that he learned during his playing and coaching careers. While Mannion never previously worked with Josh Grizzard — the Eagles’ new pass game coordinator — Grizzard also has experience in the “Shanahan” scheme.
New tight ends coach/run game coordinator Ryan Mahaffey and offensive line coach Chris Kuper have more direct links with Mannion, having crossed paths with the former backup quarterback and Packers quarterbacks coach.
Eagles wide receivers coach Aaron Moorehead running a drill with DeVonta Smith in June.
The Eagles have yet to hire a new quarterbacks coach. Existing quarterbacks coach Scot Loeffler remains on staff. Mannion, who played for the Rams, Vikings, and Seahawks during his playing career, is expected to work closely with Jalen Hurts, which could determine the type of quarterbacks coach he tabs.
Several other assistants on offense will return, as well, although their future roles are to be determined. Pass game coordinator Parks Frazier, assistant offensive line coach Greg Austin, and offensive quality control coaches Eric Dickerson and Montgomery VaGorder also will be back, sources said.
Kevin Patullo’s future with the team also remains uncertain. He was removed as offensive coordinator by Sirianni last month following his first season as a play-caller, but he currently remains with the Eagles.
Longtime offensive line coach Jeff Stoutland’s resignation last week perhaps was the most significant change thus far this offseason. Stoutland 13-year run with the Eagles came under three head coaches. He became run game coordinator 2018 but was expected to lose that responsibility amid schematic changes.
Tight end coach Jason Michael also is no longer with the organization, sources said.
On defense, most of coordinator Vic Fangio’s staff will return. Defensive backs coach/pass game coordinator Christian Parker left last month to take the Cowboys’ defensive coordinator job. The 67-year-old Fangio considered retirement for a second straight year, but he elected to return, sources told The Inquirer last week.
It’s still unclear how much of the offense will look different with Hurts and most of the starting offense slated to return. The mix of new with Mannion and old from Sirianni’s staff since he became coach in 2021 suggests there will be some carryover.
After decades in business, the expansive store along City Avenue is expected to close in April, according to a Saks Global spokesperson, who said decisions were based on several factors, including store performance and “lease economics.”
Fifty workers at the Bala Cynwyd Saks Fifth Avenue will lose their jobs effective April 11, according to a WARN Act filing with the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry. Another 155 workers at a Wilkes Barre fulfillment center will be laid off, according to a separate filing.
As part of the company’s restructuring, it will shutter seven other Saks Fifth Avenue stores, including at the American Dream mall in North Jersey, as well as a Neiman Marcus in Boston.
“Saks Global is refining its store footprint to focus on profitable locations with the highest growth potential,” company executives wrote on its website, adding that the nine closures represented “the first phase of this ongoing review.”
The move will make the company “better positioned to deliver exceptional products, elevated experiences and highly personalized service across all channels,” CEO Geoffroy van Raemdonck said in a statement.
Over the years, the Saks Fifth Avenue in Bala Cynwyd has become the brand’s only physical outpost in the region. It is referred to as “Saks Philadelphia” on the company’s website, despite being located across the city line in a freestanding building at Bala Plaza.
City Avenue is shown in April 2024. The Saks Fifth Avenue along the busy thoroughfare is closing in April.
Until recently, the longstanding Saks Fifth Avenue appeared primed to be part of the area’s future: In 2024, City Ave District, the nonprofit business development agency that straddles Lower Merion and Philadelphia, reported that business at the store was so strong that it had resisted offers to move to King of Prussia.
Once the Bala Cynwyd Saks Fifth Avenue closes, the nearest location will be in New York.
Saks Global also operates a Neiman Marcus at the King of Prussia Mall, which is not on the list of stores to close.
The Neiman Marcus at the King of Prussia Mall, pictured in 2020, will remain open.
Elsewhere in the country, Saks Global is closing the majority of its standalone Fifth Avenue Club personal styling suites, the company said Tuesday.
In New York, Bergdorf Goodman, which Saks also owns, will remain open.
What Philly-area Saks customers should know
Shoppers walk through Saks Fifth Avenue in New York in January.
Shoppers at the Bala Cynwyd store will no longer be able to buy gift cards in person, according to Saks, and will have 15 days from the start of the closing sale to use existing gift cards.
Items that were bought before the closing sale can be returned or exchanged as usual, the company said, but purchases made during it will be final. Merchandise bought during the closing sale will also be ineligible for return or exchange at stores that are remaining open.
SaksFirst credit cards will still be accepted, according to the company, and customers with those credit cards will still earn points for purchases made in store. Shoppers will no longer be able to make in-person credit card payments or apply for credit cards at the Bala Cynwyd store.
At other Saks locations, including the King of Prussia Neiman Marcus, the company says the customer experience will remain unchanged.
Philly apparently didn’t get a rise out of Taylor Chip.
The Lancaster County cookie and ice cream company abruptly shuttered its stores in Center City and Fishtown in the last week with no notice. They had been open for less than a year and a half.
In an email late Tuesday, a Taylor Chip representative said the company planned to file for bankruptcy protection under Chapter 11, which would enable it to continue operating while restructuring its financial obligations. In addition to the two Philadelphia locations, a store in Lancaster was also closed, leaving the eight-year-old company with four locations, all in Central Pennsylvania, and an e-commerce business.
A Taylor Chip midnight Oreo cookie.
The company said it had signed Philadelphia leases in late 2022 expecting a timeline and costs similar to past openings, which typically took about three months. Instead, permit delays turned what was planned as a six-month rollout into nearly two years. “Without investors, the company relied on creative financing to continue moving forward,” it said. The Philadelphia stores performed well but could not generate enough profit to offset the debt created during the delays, it said.
Taylor Chip, which launched in 2018 as a home-baking project by husband-and-wife Doug and Sara Taylor, joined a burgeoning trend of high-priced cookie shops in Philadelphia in fall 2024. The owners prided themselves on the shop’s vast cookie selection: 24 to 30 varieties available at all times. Their enormous treats, weighing more than 5 ounces and priced at $5.25 apiece, touted local ingredients and house-made inclusions.
Heavy social media marketing accompanied the September 2024 debut of a Taylor Chip beneath a nail salon at 1807 Chestnut St. in Rittenhouse, as well as the opening in a storefront at 1828 Frankford Ave., near Berks Street. Fishtowners, in particular, were irked over a lower-tech promotion that festooned parked cars with fliers made to look like tickets.
The Fishtown and Rittenhouse stores were the sixth and seventh locations for the budding business, but Doug Taylor told The Inquirer for a 2025 story on the big cookie trend that the company’s goal was to open 40,000 stores in 100 countries.
Taylor Chip has been adept at securing grants, including a $470,076 Pennsylvania Dairy Investment Program grant in 2019 (later extended) to support dairy-based processing, and a $510,971 Resilient Food Systems Infrastructure grant announced in 2025 to launch ice-cream production and expand processing to new markets with Pennsylvania dairy farms.
In December, Doug Taylor told Bloomberg News that even on a slow day, Taylor Chip can generate as much in sales in a few hours livestreaming on TikTok as the company does during a full day at one of its stores.
Taylor also said the company had hired a full-time livestream host and was building a facility in Pennsylvania with two live video studios.
This article has been updated with a company statement about the reason for the closing.
As the final two of three Di Bruno Bros. stores to close this month approached their last days, the wind-down was visible on the shelves. Cheeses, meats, breads, and prepared foods vanished first, followed by deeply discounted packaged goods that remained.
The Di Bruno locations in Wayne and the Franklin Residences in Center City, at Ninth and Sansom Streets, will close permanently on Wednesday, with no immediate clarity about what comes next. (The company’s original Italian Market store and Rittenhouse Square shop remain open.)
The closing of Di Bruno’s Ardmore branch last Wednesday, however, is already reshaping the future of Suburban Square’s Ardmore Farmers Market, where the Italian-goods purveyor opened in 2011 and eventually became the dominant tenant.
Di Bruno Bros. in Suburban Square in Ardmore on Jan. 29, about a week before its closing.
Toward the end of its run, the Ardmore location of Di Bruno Bros. occupied more than half of the market’s stalls. Rather than replacing it with another large operator, the market will be reconfigured to accommodate multiple smaller food tenants, said Douglas Green, a principal at MSC Retail, which handles leasing for Kimco Realty Corp., which owns Suburban Square.
“Di Bruno’s just kind of got too big,” Green said. “It limited cuisine diversity and pushed them into specialty items and cuisines that weren’t really their core business.”
An MSC Retail brochure shows four available spaces ranging from roughly 600 to 800 square feet, several of them divisible. Existing vendors — including Stoltzfus Meats, Ardmore Produce, Ardmore Seafood, Malvern Buttery, Sushi Sei, Tabouli, and the Ultimate Bake Shoppe — would remain, with additional “future opportunity” areas identified near the dining zones.
“The idea is to break the space up into smaller units, create more cuisine diversity, and ideally replace the Italian specialty concept,” Green said.
The original Di Bruno Bros. location at 930 S. Ninth St., as seen in 2024, is unaffected by the store closings.
Green said his firm is already negotiating with multiple potential occupants, including chefs and restaurant groups from Philadelphia interested in suburban expansions. “There’s been a tremendous amount of interest — honestly more than I ever would have imagined, and I’m not saying that in a sales-y way,” he said.
For customers, the swiftness of Di Bruno Bros.’ three-store shuttering has been striking.
Brendan Burland, an insurance consultant who lives in Bryn Mawr, stopped by the Wayne location Friday for lunch with a friend and found the bar closed and the shelves reduced to discounted goods.
“No bread, no meats, no fresh cheeses,” Burland said. “It was depressing — a total ghost town.”
Di Bruno Bros.’ largest location, at 18th and Chestnut Streets in Center City, as seen in 2024.
Burland said the store’s restaurant program had been losing its spark even before the final weeks. “The bar menu had become less inspiring over the last few years,” he said. “It started to feel like, ‘Here’s some pizza and some sandwiches,’ instead of something interesting or unique.”
What he will miss most are the basics that made Di Bruno Bros. a destination. “Their product line was pretty substantial. My buddy and I even joked that we should become cheesemongers,” he said, adding “we know nothing about it other than we like to eat cheese.”
Sandy Brown, the company’s executive vice president, said when talks began with Di Bruno Bros. in 2023, it was facing “significant financial challenges” and was at risk of not being able to continue operating.
“We even stepped in ahead of the acquisition to help ensure they could get through the 2023 holiday season, because many suppliers had already begun limiting deliveries due to concerns about the company’s stability,” Brown said.
That disruption in supply contributed to declining sales and worsening store conditions, she said. “Our goal from day one has been to stabilize the business, protect the brand, and preserve an important part of Philadelphia’s history,” Brown said. “We believed — and still believe — that Di Bruno Bros. is worth saving.”
Sandy Brown said the company decided to prioritize the “iconic” locations in the Italian Market and Rittenhouse “because these sites continue to anchor the brand.”
She said all 69 retail workers at the three closing stores were offered positions elsewhere within Di Bruno Bros. or at Brown’s Super Stores, with no loss of pay or benefits. About 70% are expected to remain, she said, while three supervisory positions were eliminated. Workers had complained on social media about the abruptness of the planned closings.
While plans are coming together for the Ardmore location, the future of the Wayne and Franklin spaces remains unresolved. A representative for Equity Retail Brokers said the Wayne space is not yet on the market. MSC Retail, which also handles commercial leasing at the Franklin location, said that space is also not yet being marketed.
The saucer in LOVE Park finally has a timeline for its revival.
After years of seeking ideas from business owners and other Philadelphians, city officials expect work on the historic building to begin in May, the city’s Parks & Recreation Department says.
But officials are still working to select a partner for the project.
In May, the city issued a “request for expressions of interest” (RFEI) from “visionary businesses, particularly those in food, beverage, retail, or hospitality,” who wanted to partner on the saucer.
City officials said the interest exceeded expectations, with more than 50 applicants submitting ideas. They included “coffee and cafe concepts, casual food offerings, beer garden hybrids, and informal meeting spaces,” according to Parks & Recreation spokesperson Ra’Chelle Rogers.
Among applicants, there was a focus on “flexible, welcoming concepts that function as a true public amenity, encouraging people to meet, linger, and connect in the park,” Rogers said.
The saucer building in LOVE Park is pictured in March 2019, amid early renovations for a bar-restaurant concept that never panned out.
In light of the demand, the city is moving into its next stage, requiring prospective partners to visit the saucer at 3 p.m. on Feb. 18 and submit a proposal online by March 18.
Prospective partners do not need to have submitted an idea in the spring, Rogers said. Any experienced food, beverage, hospitality, or community operator with the capacity to “generate sustainable revenue to support the park” is encouraged to apply, Rogers said.
“The saucer has always been envisioned as a people-first space — one that complements the park, supports programming, and welcomes both residents and visitors,” said Susan Slawson, the city’s parks & recreation commissioner. The RFEI process has given officials “confidence to move forward with a flexible, inclusive model designed for the way people actually use LOVE Park.”
The saucer, also referred to as the UFO, was added to the Philadelphia Register of Historic Places last year. Built in 1960, the building predates LOVE Park, and first served as the city hospitality center. It later housed offices for park staff.
An undated file photo of LOVE Park’s saucer building when it served as the Philadelphia Visitors Center.
For more than a decade, however, the circular structure near 16th Street and JFK Boulevard has largely sat dormant (the building has opened to the public for the Festival of Trees, a Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia fundraiser, during recent holiday seasons).
In March 2019, city officials applauded the early construction of a bar-restaurant that was set to fill LOVE Park’s saucer building. The pandemic later caused the restaurateurs to bow out of the project.
As for this latest request process, city officials said they plan to select a partner by April, and begin work a month later. The timing could coincide with Philly’s celebration of America’s 250th birthday, as well as the city’s hosting of World Cup matches and the MLB All-Star game.
The office of Councilmember Jeffery Young, whose district includes LOVE Park, is set to fund “key utility and infrastructure improvements” at the saucer, according to the city statement, and public grants are being sought to offset other upfront costs.
“Bringing an active, public-facing partner into the saucer is a milestone for LOVE Park and for Philadelphia,” Young said. “I’m proud to support improvements that make the saucer a welcoming hub for years to come.”
Those were the first words from 21-year-old former Sixers guard Jared McCain in his latest vlog after getting traded to the Oklahoma City Thunder on Feb. 4 in exchange for a 2026 first-round pick and three second-round picks.
The former Rookie of the Year front-runner was surprised when he received the news on the team bus, which was headed to the San Francisco airport ahead of the Sixers’ road game against the Los Angeles Lakers.
“We were just on the bus,” McCain said in his latest YouTube video. “I get a call saying it might happen. And then like five minutes later [Daryl Morey] calls and says, ‘You’re cooked, Jared McCain.’ He said, ‘Bye, man. Never speak to me again.’ No, they were nice about it but, you know, it’s part of the NBA.”
When McCain initially broke the news to his teammates, they didn’t believe him.
“Right when I found out, I went to the back of the bus and I told Tyrese [Maxey] and nobody, they didn’t believe me,” McCain said. “And then I think management called them and then we were all getting on the plane and then I’m crying at this point. And we get off the buses and everybody is giving me hugs and I’m just crying. It was like a movie scene. Everybody is getting on the plane and I’m just crying. Lot of tears today. Happy, sad, I don’t know.”
Maxey thought it was a joke when McCain shared the news. Afterward, the All-Star point guard publicly discussed McCain’s departure, calling him his “little brother.”
“It was just like, ‘All right, whatever. He’s just joking,’” Maxey said. “Calls start coming in, and then you realize it’s real.”
McCain had a breakout rookie season, averaging 15.3 points, 2.4 rebounds, and 2.6 assists before his season was cut short by a torn meniscus in his left knee. McCain struggled in his second season after being sidelined for surgeries on his knee and thumb. In 37 games, the young guard averaged 6.6 points, 2.0 rebounds, and 1.7 assists.
On a private jet to Oklahoma City, McCain tried to keep a positive mindset on the trade — even if that meant drawing inspiration from his favorite music artist, Drake.
“I’m in shock still,” McCain said. “I’m an OKC Thunder. What did Drake say? ‘It’s raining money, Oklahoma City Thunder. The most successful rapper 35 and under.’ Drake did say that. So, maybe it was destined for me. And it was in Weston Road Flows too. But, shout-out OKC, man. OKC, here we come. I’m excited, blessed, thankful. Let’s go have some fun.”
Throughout the rest of the video, McCain shared his first few days with his new team — whether he was practicing how to say hi to Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, visiting the Paycom Center, getting locked out of the Thunder’s training facility, meeting OKC fans, or playing in his first game with the team, when he finished with five points, two rebounds, and one assist — and received a standing ovation.
But the former Sixers first-round pick had one more message to Philly fans and it came in song form. McCain dedicated Olivia Dean’s “A Couple Minutes” to the organization and its fan base.
Jared McCain sang his heart out in a tribute to Philly fans 🥹💙
STATE COLLEGE, Pa. — Penn State faced a delayed start to the year’s first transfer window.
While most football programs were plotting next year’s rosters, coach Matt Campbell, who was named the Nittany Lions’ head coach on Dec. 5 after 10 seasons at the helm for Iowa State, was busy hiring his staff.
First he retained interim head coach Terry Smith. Then he brought several of his Iowa State assistants with him to Happy Valley. And a few weeks later, his staff was finalized. But he was behind, playing catch-up in building next season’s roster.
Campbell didn’t care, though. And neither did his staff. Because they weren’t interested in a race for the best talent or for the recruits with the most stars.
They were focused on finding the right players for their program. They recruited individuals who embody the grit and passion that have molded Penn State football into a perennial contender. And in their eyes, they accomplished that.
“We went with a mentality of not wavering from who we want this football team to be — value systems of young men that love the sport of football, young men that love Penn State, and most importantly, young men who also understand the value of an education from this institution,” Campbell said. “Those core values were really critical for us to build this football team.”
Building through the portal
Penn State fired coach James Franklin in October, which resulted in 46 players transferring this winter. But transfer season wasn’t all bad for the Nittany Lions, who added 40 players via the portal — 24 of whom came from Iowa State.
Penn State’s transfer class, which ranks No. 6 in ESPN’s 2026 transfer portal rankings, is headlined by Rocco Becht, 22. A three-year starter with a 24-12 record at Iowa State, Becht completed 60.6% of his passes for 9,274 yards and 64 touchdowns.
In 2024, Becht was an All-Big 12 honorable mention selection after quarterbacking the Cyclones to their winningest season in program history.
Campbell said he believes the quarterback and head coach must be “tied at the hip.” And he thinks his relationship with Becht, who last season played through a torn labrum in his non-throwing shoulder, exemplifies the connectivity essential to creating a successful program.
Matt Campbell said quarterback Rocco Becht is as “competitive as any football player I’ve been around.”
“I believe Penn State football is [about] integrity, character, class, excellence, and grit. [Becht] embodies every one of those traits,” Campbell said. “He’s as tough and as competitive as any football player I’ve been around … I’m really excited for him to continue to lead and grow within our football program.”
Taylor Mouser, Penn State’s offensive coordinator who spent the last two seasons in the same role at Iowa State, brings continued camaraderie with his experienced quarterback. But he wants more from the position.
His philosophy with his offensive players resembles Campbell’s roster-building philosophy. He wants a unified offense filled with “unselfish guys” who are connected to their teammates, coaches, and community.
“I want guys who can provide connection for their teammates. I want guys who can provide energy to the people on the field,” Mouser said. “Your defense is going to play better when they believe in the quarterback. So if you’re going to be a quarterback for us [at Penn State], you’d better have relationships with everybody on the team.”
Creating a culture
Every coach wants to establish a winning culture — one built on hard work, accountability, and trust. But Campbell understands that building a culture isn’t easy, and it takes years to build trust.
“Culture is not words. It’s how you live, it’s how you act, it’s how you carry yourself,” Campbell said. “… It’s all about the people. It’s about aligning the team and the people together. That’s one of the things that I at least know I can look myself in the mirror and [say], ‘We brought the right leaders of young men into our football program.’”
One of those culture builders is Ryan Clanton, Penn State’s offensive line coach who spent the last three seasons in the same role at Iowa State. The former Oregon offensive lineman said Campbell’s success stems from his character, which resembles a “normal dude.”
Clanton called Campbell the easiest coach to work for in college football. It’s why, when Campbell asked Clanton to follow him to Happy Valley, the line coach’s answer was simple: “What time does the plane leave?”
“[Campbell] is the best head coach in the nation. Wherever he went, I was going to go at any level,” Clanton said. “What people don’t see is that he’s very caring. He’ll talk to the janitor for all hours of the night. He can connect with anybody. And he likes to have fun … It’s a blessing to be with him.”
Esperanza Academy Charter High School teachers and staff have unionized.
The brand-new Esperanza High School Collective, a chapter of the American Federation of Teachers, now represents nearly 80 staff at the school.
The move comes during a period of turmoil at the school, after some employees were laid off abruptly in December. Current and former staff say there have been sudden and arbitrary changes at the school, including larger class sizes and fewer staff working directly with children.
Union recognition was hard fought — a majority of the staff signed union cards in the fall, but the Esperanza administration declined to voluntarily recognize the collective.
Instead, the AFT had to go through the National Labor Relations Board, which held an election in late January. In all, 87% of the Esperanza Academy Charter High School staff voted to unionize. (Staff at Esperanza’s elementary and middle schools have not unionized.)
Wendy G. Coleman, president of AFT Pennsylvania, said the organization was “thrilled” to welcome Esperanza Academy high school staff.
“These dedicated educators and staff work tirelessly to ensure that their students receive the best possible education, and AFTPA is ready to work just as diligently to help them secure better class sizes, higher wages, and adequate resources for every member in their first contract,” Coleman said in a statement. “As we know, our members’ working conditions are our students’ learning conditions, and we’re excited to see what the future holds for the Esperanza High School Collective in their first contract.”
Esperanza is the sixth of Philadelphia’s 81 charter schools to form a union; the vast majority of Pennsylvania charters are not unionized.
The Union have added another major signing to what has already been a busy winter transfer window for the club.
The team announced Tuesday that it had acquired Agustín Anello, a 23-year old forward who spent last season with Uruguayan team Boston River.
The Union paid a transfer fee of around $2 million to acquire Anello, a source with knowledge of the deal told The Inquirer. He has been with the team at its preseason camp in Clearwater, Fla., for a few days, and could debut in Tuesday’s final preseason game against CF Montréal (6 p.m., livestreaming on the Union’s website and YouTube).
“Agustín is a versatile, dynamic attacker,” Union manager Bradley Carnell said in the team’s release. “His development in Europe, combined with his recent breakout in Uruguay, reflects a clear upward trajectory. As a domestic player with U.S. youth national team experience, he fits our profile well.”
The Athletic reported that the Union were in talks to sign Anello in January and reported that a deal was being finalized on Feb. 2. Anello let a poorly kept secret further out when he posted a picture from Clearwater on his Instagram story on Monday afternoon. The Union’s logo was visible on Anello’s shorts in the post.
Anello grew up in south Florida and moved with his family to Spain at age 10. He hasn’t lived in the United States since. At 17, he turned pro in Belgium, and played for a range of clubs there, in Croatia, and the Netherlands before moving to Uruguay in the summer of 2024.
Although it has been a long time since he last formally called America home, Anello is not a total stranger to the Union. In November 2023, he was teammates with Nathan Harriel and Jack McGlynn on a U.S. under-23 national team squad that surveyed candidates for the 2024 Olympics.
Anello scored 10 goals across all competitions for Boston River in 2025.
After their preseason finale, the Union’s next match will be a Concacaf Champions Cup game in Trinidad against Defence Force F.C. on Feb. 18.
The Union will open their MLS schedule with a trip to D.C. United on Feb. 21.
Since moving to Glenside in 2016, Brooklyn transplants Damien Graef and Robyn Semien have frequented the Evergreen Cheese Shop in Chestnut Hill, located in a charming courtyard that fringes a parking lot off East Evergreen Avenue, steps from Germantown Avenue. As time went on, the couple took note of two empty buildings next door to the cheese shop, the former homes of Top of the Hill Market, which closed in 2019, and Mimi’s Cafe, which closed in 2022.
As entrepreneurs— the couple own a Williamsburg wine shop together, and Semien runs the podcast company Placement Theory — their gears started turning. “We’d always had this loose idea that maybe someday we’d open [another] wine store, but the logistics are hard,” Semien said.
Part of the bottle selection at Lovat Square.
In 2023, they chatted up John Ingersoll, the Evergreen Cheese owner, who referred them to the landlord for the space at 184 E. Evergreen Ave.
Graef and Semien were not entirely sure what they wanted to create. “We said, ‘Let’s put one foot in front of the other and see how far we get,’” said Graef. “Turns out, pretty far.”
After sitting dark for four-plus years, the Evergreen Avenue courtyard will light up again this week with the opening of Lovat Square, which the couple plan to unfold in stages: first as a bottle shop, then as a garden restaurant, and eventually as a full bar and dining room.
Lovat Square’s bottle shop and tasting room opens Thursday, with about 30 seats, wines by the glass, and a small menu of snacks. The wine selection — just under 400 labels, with about 200 more on the way — doubles as both retail inventory and will become the backbone of the restaurant’s wine list.
Thursday’s opening is a hopeful sign for Chestnut Hill, stung from the recent closings of Iron Hill Brewery and Campbell’s Place. Other coming attractions in the near future will be the Blue Warbler, a day-into-evening restaurant at Germantown and Willow Grove Avenue, and a reopening of Fiesta Pizza on Germantown Avenue near Gravers Lane.
Before relocating from New York with their two children, Semien and Graef opened the Brooklyn wine shop Bibber & Bell in 2013. Since 2022, Graef has been lead sommelier at Jean-Georges at the Four Seasons Hotel. Semien spent 16 years at This American Life and now executive-produces Question Everything, a show focused on journalism in America.
A table at Lovat Square houses a collection of Champagnes and other bubbly wines.
Lovat Square — pronounced “love it,” named after a shade of green often used in tweed — will start with a by-the-glass program of about 15 wines, though Graef expects that number to fluctuate as additional bottles are opened for tastings, events, and informal pours. Snacks — house-made pickles, focaccia, sour cream soubise with potato chips (with optional trout or ossetra caviar), and a cheese plate created by Evergreen’s Ingersoll — will accompany the wine during the initial phase. More substantial food will come later as the outdoor and indoor dining spaces open.
“I think of the wine-shop phase as a cocktail party: small bites while we build toward the main course,” he said.
Co-owner Damien Graef pours Chartogne-Taillet Champagne Sainte Anne for sampling at Lovat Square.
Graef is focusing on independent winemakers. “You’re not going to find Josh or Caymus [wines] here,” Graef said. “But we’ll have something for the person who likes that style. The through-line is small producers who are serious about their land and what they’re making.”
The shelves skew European, with a particular emphasis on Italy and France, but also include wines from the United States, South America, and Eastern Europe. There’s a long table devoted just to Champagne and other bubbles.
The spring opening of the courtyard garden will expand the menu into full dinner service, with seating for about 70. Just under half of those seats are expected to be under a canopy by late summer, extending usability into the shoulder seasons.
Lovat Square’s final phase, targeted for late fall, will bring a full-service restaurant and cocktail bar, including an 18-seat bar and counter seating along the front windows of the former Mimi’s, a separate building in the courtyard.
Lovat Square opens Thursday at 184 E. Evergreen Ave.
Graef, born in the Bay Area but raised in New Jersey, has spent his career in restaurants, beginning as a dishwasher at 13 before moving through kitchens and into front-of-house roles. In the early 2000s he worked at Il Buco in New York, where he met Semien (also a Bay Area native) and Lovat Square manager Patricia Jo Peacock. “I thought I knew something about wine [then], but that was very short-lived,” Semien said.
At the time, Graef was a beer-only drinker — and “not like great beer or anything: Negra Modelo and Yuengling.”
While Graef was at Il Buco, wine director Roberto Paris demystified wine for him. “Getting to meet winemakers for the first time and having them eat family meal with us and get to taste their wine and talk about these little corners of Italy that they were coming from made it more accessible for me,” he said. “That really turned me onto all of this, and then I just fell deep down that hole and have not gotten out since. And it’s only got worse.”
Graef later worked at Chanterelle in TriBeCa before running Aurora in Brooklyn, known for its Italian wine list. As Lovat Square ramps up, he is transitioning to a part-time role at the Four Seasons.
The Chestnut Hill project, the couple said, reflects both their professional histories and their lives in the neighborhood.
“We’re trying to build our favorite place,” Graef said.
Lovat Square, 184 E. Evergreen Ave., lovatsquare.com. Initial hours: noon to 10 p.m. Thursday to Sunday.
