Georgetown Current
New Owner Takes Reins at Beloved Scheele’s Market
May 15, 2012By Deirdre Bannon
Current Staff Writer
At Scheele’s Market, the longest-running corner store in Georgetown, the future looks bright. A new owner is taking over the business from Shin and Kye Lee, who are retiring after operating the store for more than 20 years. And East Village neighbors and loyal customers are poised to celebrate the success of their four-year effort to help save one of the last independent markets in the neighborhood.
“The community is jumping,” said Malcolm “Mike” Peabody, who led the effort to secure the store’s future by establishing a nonprofit, Friends of Scheele’s, with Marilyn Melkonian. “We were buoyed when the new owner was named. Scheele’s is essential to the neighborhood — it holds the community together. After working on this for four years, we can now relax.”
That work began in 2008, when the building at the corner of Dumbarton and 29th streets, owned by the Scheele family for 118 years, was put up for sale. Neighbors were instantly worried that a new owner would raise rents beyond the Lees’ ability to pay, or convert the property, which now has an apartment on the second floor, into a potentially more valuable single-family home.
A small group of neighbors first tried to protect the store by collectively purchasing the building, but the offer wasn’t accepted. Then Mark Teren, a local developer who has flipped several Georgetown properties, submitted a successful offer, but the deal fell through.
In February 2011, Jordan O’Neill, a real estate investor and former banker, purchased the property. Friends of Scheele’s successfully negotiated a covenant with O’Neill to keep the first floor as a grocery store for the next 15 years, even if O’Neill sells the property.
In exchange, Friends of Scheele’s agreed to pay O’Neill $70,000 for the covenant. Some of the funds will be used for store renovations.
“Many people don’t understand why we’re paying Jordan,” said Peabody. “He’s giving up his right to make much more money on the property by turning it into a single-family house, and we’re getting something of value in return — at a very good deal.”
“If this market were to be closed, we couldn’t open a new store because zoning laws wouldn’t allow it,” he added. “Scheele’s was grandfathered in, and we’re very pleased that Jordan agreed that maintaining the store is very important to the community.”
Likewise, O’Neill was glad to be a part of the effort.
“I’m very pleased that the neighborhood has been so gracious in helping to preserve this East Village landmark,” he said. “I’m proud that we will keep it as a general store selling fresh produce, beer and wine.”
While the agreement with O’Neill offered some relief that the store would remain, the Lees, meanwhile, were considering retirement. That issue put the fate of the store in limbo again, until Dong Kuk Kim emerged as the new operator.
As part of the transition, Kim has worked in the store alongside the Lees over the past two weeks. They introduced him to regular customers, helped him get to know the inventory — and taught him how to use their old-fashioned store-credit system, in which some customers’ receipts are tallied on sheets of colored card stock and filed next to the cash register. Those customers typically pay their accounts monthly.
Although the Lees’ last official day in the store was Friday, Shin Lee said he would periodically stop by to see how Kim is getting on.
Retiring was not an easy decision for the couple. When asked what the community support has meant to him, Shin Lee got tears in his eyes.
“It is very touching,” he said. “They accepted us, and we will miss them. We thank them for everything they did for us.”
In a one-page letter that will be posted in the store, Kye Lee wrote, “Scheele’s was more than a business; it was part of our family. … We can never thank you enough for all your unending show of love and support for the little corner store. You all have become a part of our lives and we will never forget the friendship we’ve found here.”
Kim, who formerly owned a deli in Silver Spring and had been looking for a new business for several months, said he’s very excited to take over for the Lees. He said he loves the neighborhood and has found the customers to be very welcoming.
“I want to keep the tradition of Scheele’s Market going,” he said. “I plan to serve the neighborhood with good products and bring new ones in.”
In addition to renovating the store, Kim would like to add sidewalk seating outside.
Kim would like to operate Scheele’s Market for the next 20 years or so. “I hope to make my American dream come true here,” he said.
Friends of Scheele’s will be hosting a block party with live music and food outside the store on June 21 from 6 to 9 p.m. (rain date June 22). According to Peabody, the party was organized to say farewell to the Lees, to welcome Kim and his family to the neighborhood, and to raise funds for the covenant.
So far, Friends of Scheele’s has raised approximately $20,000 of the $70,000 needed. Peabody said the group didn’t want to make a big fundraising push until a new owner was in place. Tickets to the event cost $75.
For more information or to make a donation, email Malcolm Peabody at mpeabody@ptmanagement.com.
This article appears in the May 16 issue of The Georgetown Current newspaper.
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City Relaxes Glover Park Moratorium
May 9, 2012By Brady Holt
Current Staff Writer
Soon after the city relaxed the moratorium on new liquor licenses in Glover Park, a new Vietnamese restaurant is looking to open up in the former Margarita’s spot at 2317 Wisconsin Ave.
The Alcoholic Beverage Control Board last month followed the advisory neighborhood commission’s recommendation to continue to cap the number of liquor licenses in Glover Park, but to increase the limit of restaurants with full alcohol service from 12 to 14. Soon afterward, the board received a license application for a new fast-casual Vietnamese restaurant, District Noodles.
“It’s exciting to see that the decision to add two new restaurant liquor licenses in Glover Park is working as intended to help draw new restaurants to the neighborhood,” neighborhood commission chair Brian Cohen wrote in an email. “And we hope that a few more restaurants take advantage of the available licenses and choose to open in Glover Park.”
Just 10 alcohol-serving establishments are now open in the neighborhood — two existing licenses aren’t in use, and no one has yet applied for the second newly available one. According to neighborhood commissioner Jackie Blumenthal, whose single-member district covers the neighborhood’s Wisconsin Avenue commercial strip, another new restaurant is considering leasing space in Glover Park and might therefore take one of the other licenses.
The expanded moratorium is designed to allow for more restaurants while preventing an explosion of nightlife establishments that some residents fear could transform the neighborhood for the worse. But neighborhood commissioner Ben Thielen, who opposed continuing the liquor license moratorium, said the cap is stifling Glover Park’s dining options.
“People along the Wisconsin Avenue corridor clearly want more dining options and, unfortunately, the limit on [restaurant-class] licenses restricts these choices,” Thielen wrote in an email.
When the neighborhood commission voted to extend the moratorium in February, several residents said they worried that existing businesses would snap up the few new licenses, closing that opportunity for new restaurants.
If the alcohol board approves the District Noodles application after a scheduled June 25 hearing, it will join Mayfair & Pine, 2218 Wisconsin Ave., as one of two new restaurants opening in the neighborhood this year. Mayfair & Pine, with former “Top Chef” contestant Emily Sprissler at the helm, is expected to open later this spring at the former location of Town Hall, which moved up the street.
District Noodles has applied for hours of operation for 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. daily and seating capacity of 50 patrons. Residents have until June 11 to protest the application.
Blumenthal said she’s inviting a representative of the restaurant to present at the neighborhood commission’s June meeting, but noted that the concept seems promising.
“District Noodles sounds like a great addition to Glover Park’s broad range of restaurant offerings,” she wrote in an email. “Vietnamese food is very subtle-tasting and healthy, so I for one am looking forward to being among its first patrons.”
This article appears in the May 9 issue of The Georgetown Current newspaper.
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At Historic Box Knot Garden, a Return to Form
May 1, 2012By Deirdre Bannon
Current Staff Writer
At Tudor Place, the early-19th-century Georgetown estate, something old is new again: After nearly 80 years, the home’s well-known box knot garden has been fully restored.
An official dedication will take place May 8 for the geometrically designed garden, which now features new boxwood plants and rosebushes along with an improved drainage system. Meanwhile, a report on findings from a recent archaeological dig at the garden is expected to be released in the coming weeks.
The garden’s formal layout now more closely resembles the way it appeared in 1933. That design, in turn, was modeled after the home’s original garden from the early 1800s, planted by the home’s first owner and Martha Washington’s granddaughter, Martha Custis.
“The restoration of the box knot garden really brings to life one of the very earliest landscape features of the property,” said Leslie Buhler, executive director of Tudor Place.
“The need was clearly there because the knot garden that had been there was failing,” Buhler said. “The garden was suffering from water damage due to poor drainage and changing climatic conditions. This was the first major project to restore a historic feature like this on the property, and that was very exciting.”
The project took place in fall 2011 after months of planning. The drainage system, though replaced about five years prior, wasn’t working as it should have: The ground had become overly saturated and the soil too compact, and as a result the boxwood plants were dying.
Suzanne Bouchard, Tudor Place’s director of gardens and grounds, determined that the only way to save the garden was to completely overhaul it.
“We removed everything,” said Bouchard, who managed the project.
First, the garden was mapped and the plants were tagged. Rosebushes were cut back to between 10 and 15 inches tall for easier removal, and were later replanted in their original locations.
But the existing boxwoods had a different fate.
“Instead of replacing the English boxwood that was there, we changed the variety that we put back in, using Green Beauty boxwood for the exterior border and Justin Brouwers boxwood for the interior border because they’re much hardier and can tolerate the conditions of the knot garden much better,” Bouchard said.
The boxwoods that could be saved were replanted elsewhere on the grounds.
The restoration process also yielded a unique opportunity: Since the garden was bare for the first time in 80 years, an archaeological dig could be conducted on one of the property’s most historic areas.
According to Buhler, archaeologists unearthed a number of artifacts within several 5-foot grids, including porcelain and glass, as well as bricks that might date back to house’s original construction. They also discovered a layer of oyster shells used in the garden’s original pathways as well as in the driveway.
“There’s so much you can’t know until you go into the ground to try to find it, including early buildings that aren’t on any maps,” Buhler said.
Previous digs on other areas of the property found evidence of what might have been a dairy building, along with a substantial 18th-century structure that appears to have burned down.
“It’s fascinating, so you try to piece everything together, and you look at letters, diaries and things like that to see what was on the site and to try to get a picture of everything that was once there,” Buhler said.
The property has an illustrious past. The land, comprising one city block on 31st Street between Q and R streets, was purchased in the early 1800s by Thomas Peter, son of the first mayor of Georgetown, and his wife Martha Custis Peter. They designed the home and gardens with the help of self-taught architect William Thornton, who also designed the first U.S. Capitol building.
For 179 years, the home remained in the Peter family, which often entertained political and cultural leaders. Following the death in 1988 of owner Armistead Peter III, the home opened as a historic site under the stewardship of the Tudor Place Foundation. The property is classified as a national historic landmark.
The recent project isn’t the first time that Tudor Place’s box knot garden has needed restoration. Back in the 1860s, then-owner Britannia Peter Kennon leased the property to tenants for financial reasons, and the garden fell into disrepair. Due to the Civil War, it could not be immediately restored once Kennon returned. For more than 60 years, it was thought that the garden’s pattern was lost forever.
It was Armistead III who found the garden’s original design. A Peter family cousin had made a rendering of it in the early 1800s so she could replicate it at her Virginia estate, Avenel. Armistead spotted the drawing in a book on historic Virginia gardens published in 1926, and used it as inspiration for the 1933 restoration.
The current restoration was the first phase of a plan to restore all of the gardens at Tudor Place.
“It’s rare to have a historic site in the middle of the city that still has enough of its land to be able to explore that history,” said Buhler. She hopes that visitors are “able to come and see how a box knot was done in the early 1800s and imagine what they might be able to do in their own gardens today.”
Admission to Tudor Place starts at $3 for self-guided tours, including an audio guide that can be downloaded to smartphones. Details are available at tudorplace.org.
This article appears in the May 2 issue of The Georgetown Current newspaper.
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