Blue Ocean (6335 Delmar) will be closing before the month’s end—the victim of an eviction it tried to fight. The late-night sushi and ramen spot was a familiar landmark in the heart of the Delmar Loop for 17 years.
General manager Ben Sawyer recently took over the restaurant from its founder, Eakachai Ploentham. Sawyer says the restaurant fell behind on rent during the pandemic, but he believes Ploentham had an oral representation from its longtime landlord not to worry about it. He says the matter didn’t come up for years after that. He was surprised when, earlier this year, the landlord cited those missing payments as a reason Blue Ocean needed to vacate in 30 days.
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Citing a 15-year lease that wasn’t up until next year, Blue Ocean tried to fight back, but in July, landlord Hofgrit LC filed for an eviction, alleging $70,295 in unpaid rent, as well as $35,608 in utility payments. (The landlord’s attorney, Christine Travaglini, didn’t respond to a message seeking comment yesterday.)
St. Louis County Circuit Court Associate Judge Krista Peyton granted the eviction on Monday. She gave the restaurant until Oct. 31 to vacate.
Sawyer says the restaurant is now hoping to find a new spot in the Loop.
“There’s not many streets where people have groceries or a bag of clothes they just bought, and they’re walking around having lunch or dinner,” he says. “I still love the place. We’re not exclusively nailed down to U. City, but we have such a long history of serving that community that we would love to continue to do that.”
Sawyer says he believes the landlord wanted Blue Ocean out to make way for a noodle shop whose owners have deeper pockets. He points to posts that have been made on Red Note, the Chinese social media platform, suggesting another restaurant is already on the way. “I think the landlord has a new tenant, and they want us out,” he says.
The restaurant has posted a GoFundMe to help with its transition costs. Sawyer says they simply don’t have the money to pay for the up-front costs that come with a new lease and are hoping regulars can help out—if only for coming by for a last meal or two in their final weeks.
“We would encourage people to make reservations, so we’re not surprised by it, because we run pretty efficiently, and if we double in business, we start running out of things, and we don’t want to disappoint people,” he says, adding, “We’ll definitely throw one more party.”
And after that, who knows. Noting the large number of noodle shops that have opened on the Loop in recent years, Sawyer says he’d like Blue Ocean to go in a different direction.
“We’re a restaurant that has a bar, and we kind of want to go to a bar that has food,” he says. “That might set us apart from every other noodle shop.”
