Corners Tavern, the cool, stylish gastropub that’s held forth at Broadway Plaza for seven years, will close at the end of business today.
Employees at the restaurant confirmed the shutdown but weren’t sure if the restaurant would serve until the normal hour of 9 p.m.
By mid-afternoon, the owners, the Moana Restaurant Group, had not yet issued a statement about the reasons behind the closing.
Corners is located in the space that formerly housed the upscale Bing’s, a restaurant that also had a seven-year run before closing abruptly because of economic pressures and nearby competition. The tavern was launched in 2012 by a trio of restaurateurs from San Francisco’s Town Hall, Salt House and Anchor & Hope — Steven and Mitchell Rosenthal and Doug Washington — in partnership with Moana.
From the beginning, the hip, eclectic space was a “must make reservations” hit.
“You could spend an entire evening basking in the savory flavors and comfortable chairs and enjoying the warm spring breeze wafting through the massive roll-up doors — and never notice that the floor is tiled with pools of pennies, the murals evoke a Brothers Grimm world and the antique snake cases that divide the publike alcoves in the bar hold tiny dioramas of bizarre, often hilarious scenes of cat ladies and strange rabbits,” the Bay Area News Group’s Jackie Burrell wrote in a 2012 review.
A year later that trio pulled out and left the restaurant in the hands of Moana. Chef Gavin Schmidt (Coi, Campton Place and Aqua) took over the farm-to-table kitchen.
The Moana group, which is based in San Rafael, had previously closed two other Contra Costa County restaurants, Yankee Pier in Lafayette in early 2019 and the Lark Creek Grill in Walnut Creek in mid-2017. The group currently owns three restaurants in the South Bay (Parcel 104, The Farmers Union, Olla Cocina) and a number of restaurants in Wine Country. Its parent group owns one Contra Costa restaurant, Piatti in Danville.
Details: 1342 Broadway Plaza, Walnut Creek; 925-948-8711; www.cornerstavern.com