Following the closure of Beso on 18th Street in the Castro last week, we have news of a taker for the space, and it's the team behind Mediterranean spot Lark just a few doors down.
The new concept will be called Butcher & Farm, as Hoodline first reported Monday, and while the name implies some whole-animal, farm-to-table cookery, we don't know any details just yet.
What we do know via the liquor license transfer is that the man behind the project is restaurateur Coskun Abik. Abik opened Turkish restaurant Dunya on Polk Street in 2010, and followed that with the similar but different Lark in 2015. Both Dunya and Lark specialize in lamb and seafood dishes with Turkish and Greek influences. As of last year, Lark gained a full-bar liquor license to go with its already respected wine program.
The space at 4058 18th Street was newly built out as a restaurant when Beso opened there in the summer of 2014. The place was known for its great tapas and top-notch paella, and in this day and age, five years is a pretty good run! But the closure followed another by the same restaurant group in the Castro a few months earlier: Bisou. (The names mean "kiss" in Spanish and French, respectively.)
The Bisou/Beso team, meanwhile, has moved their tapas game over to the recently opened Pawn Shop in SoMa — a speakeasy bar/restaurant next door to Monarch. Hoodline reported last week that a number of Beso's employees have transferred over there as well.
Photo: Nicholas G./Yelp