Eagle-eyed sleuths spotted a sliver of news on the Guthrie’s Tavern website this week, where it was announced that the legendary bar, which closed to great fanfare and much lament last summer, was “under new ownership” and that fans should “stay tuned” for details.
We have the details.
Matt Baldino, who owns Commonwealth Tavern in Roscoe Village, bought Guthrie’s earlier this year and plans to reopen the Wrigleyville bar this summer. He’s aiming for June 1.
“It came down to whether we wanted another crappy condominium building to go up, or to save a piece of Chicago history,” Baldino said Thursday. “I’m a big fan of trying to save a piece of Chicago history. I know some people don’t see bars that way, but I do.”
Sitting five blocks west of Wrigley Field, Guthrie’s Tavern had operated until last summer as a relic of another era of Chicago, a quiet neighborhood joint firmly rooted in its 1986 opening. Other than an evolving beer menu that embraced the rise of local craft beer, it barely seemed to change with the passing years. It remained best known for its ornate, hand-painted ceiling tiles, ample supply of board games and cozy comfort as one of the neighborhood’s best date spots.
But on July 20, hours after the city shut down indoor seating for bars that did not sell food as part of the effort to stem the spread of COVID-19, former Guthrie’s owner Steve Leith announced on Facebook that he would shutter the bar permanently. After a forced closure due to the pandemic in spring, Leith said in an interview last summer, he planned to close the bar and retire if another closure came. He kept his word.
“The idea of running a quote-unquote ‘COVID bar’ was so far from what that bar was supposed to be,” Leith told the Tribune last year.
One longtime employee called the closing “almost like a death in the family.” An army of well-wishers spent the following days bidding farewell to the bar.
However, Baldino said, it was widely known in the bar and restaurant industry that Leith wanted to sell Guthrie’s and see it reopen under new ownership. There were multiple suitors, though Baldino said he initially wasn’t one of them because “neighborhood bars are becoming increasingly difficult to operate in the city.”
But multiple people, including his brother, urged him to take a run at the bar, and ultimately his own sentimentality won out; Baldino said he and his wife went to Guthrie’s during their earliest days of dating.
Baldino bought Guthrie’s in January, according to city records. Terms of the sale, which included the building and two apartments above the bar, were not disclosed.
Block Club Chicago first reported news of the reopening.
Baldino said he aims to ensure “Guthrie’s is staying Guthrie’s,” albeit with a few tweaks, many related to COVID-19. He wants to add outdoor seating, including a sidewalk patio on Lakewood Avenue that would accommodate about 40 people. Baldino said outdoor seating has become imperative during the pandemic.
He’s also putting in new windows that open (but will retain the old Guthrie’s logo on them) and installing a “state-of-the-art HVAC system” above the ceiling tiles that were painted by customers and Leith’s wife, Laura.
Baldino said he is making sure to return each one to its rightful place.
“Our motto is to preserve and enhance — and preserve is first,” he said.
He’ll serve mostly Chicago-made beer on draft until the pandemic abates — “You’ve got to protect local businesses during a pandemic” — but also Guinness and Miller Lite. Guthrie’s will serve frozen pizzas made by legendary Rogers Park pizzeria Candlelite.
And the board games will stick around. Leith told the Tribune last summer that the bar “came up with the board game idea and took it to the max.”
“You’d go in there on a Friday night, and virtually every table would have a board game out,” he said. “It was absolutely amazing.”
Baldino said he wants to maintain and expand the game motif, adding chess, games leagues and a euchre night.
“The basic ethos of Guthrie’s being a true neighborhood bar, all that stays,” he said.
Bennett Lawson, chief of staff for Ald. Tom Tunney, 44th, said the return of Guthrie’s is good news for the neighborhood.
“From a community perspective, they were always a great neighbor,” he said. “We’re happy to have them come back, obviously. Any business that can survive the pandemic is a testament to what they’ve built and their customer base.”
