Less than a week after being threatened by flames, Nancy O's is ready to reopen its doors.
Co-owners Garrett Fedorkiw and Eoin Foley announced the popular Third Avenue restaurant will open for lunch today at
11 a.m., after staff spent the last few days cleaning up from the May 6 fire that destroyed the neighbouring two buildings.
Damage at Nancy O's was limited to smoke and ash, as well as some food spoilage from an electrical outage.
"The firefighters did a great job of saving the place," said Foley, highlighting the presence of a firewall between the restaurant and the former FlipSide building next door, which he and Fedorkiw had purchased and were renovating to turn into a new eatery.
Foley wasn't among the full house at Nancy O's last Wednesday night when the fire broke out after 9:30 p.m., but received a call from a staff member that the building next door was alight.
"I wanted to make sure that everyone was safe and was praying that Nancy O's wouldn't go up with it and really concerned because I know the state of the building where the fire started and Homework," Foley said of his thoughts upon receiving that call.
"Both are such old buildings that are kind of interconnected, that I was really afraid that would go up, too, which we see is what ended up happening."
Though their new concept restaurant - slated to open this summer - was destroyed, Foley expressed further concern for the loss of retail boutique Homework. The store opened less than two months ago in its new location after moving from the corner of Third Avenue and Quebec Street.
"I feel incredibly terrible for what happened to Homework," Foley said.
"They bought it just shortly before we bought the old Flipside building and they worked really hard for several months renovating the place, making it so beautiful inside."
The original aesthetic of the old buildings can't be replaced, regardless of any intentions to rebuild, he said.
"Homework had done a great job of kind of showing off the old charm and the character of the building and we had been planning on doing a lot of similar things with highlighting the original structure of the building," said Foley.
Since news of the fire broke, the Nancy O's team has been inundated with support.
"It's been really amazing," said Foley, citing hundreds of messages of condolence, support and offers of help coming through email and social media. "We can't express how grateful we are for the support from the community."
They're also grateful for a customer who was on her way in to the restaurant last Wednesday for a birthday party and alerted staff and patrons to the neighbouring fire.
"I believe her name is Ingrid - we actually have the present she was bringing in to give back to her. We found it (Thursday) morning," said Foley.
"Without her warning, if the fire had been let to build for a little longer without any more attention, it could have been a hell of a lot worse. So we're very grateful for her notification."
