Fine dining headed to Fayetteville

Feb. 10—fayetteville — New life has been breathed into the detoured ambitions for a local historical property.

Thus, The Gaines Estate Restaurant will be a reality as of next week.

The restaurant is located at 225 W. Maple Ave. on the grounds of The Gaines Estate. According to historical information supplied by Mandy Wriston, of Appalachian Queen Consulting and PR, The Gaines Estate property was originally purchased shortly after the Civil War by Major Theophilus Gaines, who was a soldier in the Union Army and former judge advocate for southern West Virginia.

In 1920, his grandson, L. Ebersole Gaines, built the Neo-Colonial style house that stands today as a contributing building in the Fayetteville Historic District, which was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1990.

The restaurant, which will offer upscale casual fine dining, will be open five days a week for evening meals beginning Friday, Feb. 16, with the lounge opening at 4 p.m. and dinner being served from 5 to 10 p.m.

A Business After Hours and restaurant soft opening will be presented by the Beckley-Raleigh County Chamber of Commerce, Fayette County Chamber of Commerce, The Gaines Estate, Visit Southern West Virginia and Visit Fayetteville WV on Thursday, Feb. 15. The BAH event will run from 4:30 to 6 p.m. that evening, with appetizers, drinks and door prizes available. Restaurant seating for the soft opening will follow from 6 to 9 p.m. Dinner reservations are required at 304-382-7509.

In 2008, a fire nearly destroyed the house, which had been vacant since 1986. Cascade Properties LLC purchased The Gaines Estate in 2012 and restored the structure as closely as possible to its original design and condition, according to a press release. Since opening for business in 2020, the estate has been used as a meeting, event and wedding venue. That venture will continue, with the restaurant closing on days when large weddings and other events are scheduled.

Fast forward to 2024, and the restaurant is back on the menu to complement the wedding and events package.

"We've kind of gone full circle," said Bill Wells, who owns the property along with his wife, Sally, and Charleston residents Richard and Melissa Stephens. "When we bought the property in 2012, we renovated the house, and our goal originally was to open the house as a restaurant, and we were going to build vacation rental cottages in the pasture field."

The field is part of the 192 acres of the property Cascade Properties owns.

"Shortly after we purchased the property, a woman contacted us and asked us if her daughter could get married on the property," Wells explained. "The house was burned out; we had no power, no water, no bathrooms. She said, 'Don't worry, I'll take care of everything,' and she put together the most amazing wedding. So, that's where we got the idea to open as a wedding and events venue."

The venue will celebrate hosting its 100th wedding sometime this year, he said.

According to Wells, The Gaines Estate Restaurant will be open five days a week, Tuesday through Saturday, "and we'll occasionally open up for Sunday brunch, maybe once a month or something like that." At the outset, it will feature dinner seating only.

Wells is excited with the scope of the culinary fare the restaurant will offer the dining public.

"What we're going to be offering is upscale casual fine dining cuisine," he said. "We've hired our chef, Shane Blankenship, and sous-chef, Greg Lilly, both formerly of Dobra Zupas (a Beckley restaurant which closed in 2023). They've developed a new menu."

Wells said it was an "easy transition" since Blankenship and Lilly "knew our kitchen, they knew our catering menu," as Dobra Zupas catered for The Gaines Estate from its inception until last year.

The menu will include items such as caramelized and goat cheese flatbread, wings, salad options, burgers and other sandwich options. Entrees will include seared trout, rib eye, filet au poivre and Tuscan chicken and gnocchi, as well as other occasional featured items which aren't on the regular menu.

The restaurant has a full ABCA liquor license, so beer, wine and cocktails will be available, Wells said.

The restaurant will be staffed by about 12 people. Ally McAllister, the front of house manager and wedding event coordinator, is a "key person" in the organization, according to Wells.

"We'll have indoor seating in the winter months, and outdoor seating on the porch and deck in the summer months," Wells noted. "We'll have our lounge open, as well. And we'll have outside music once nice weather hits."

"Right now we have seating for approximately 50," Wells said Wednesday. "But we have two bedrooms upstairs that will be converted to dining rooms, and we can add a few more tables.

"I think we'll increase to 75 indoors, and we have the same capacity outdoors (in the spring, summer and fall)."

"We are excited to welcome Chefs Blankenship and Lilly to our staff and to offer upscale casual and fine dining cuisine to the public," Wells said. "The historic elegance of The Gaines Estate and the al fresco dining opportunities of the mansion's two decks and covered porch with views of the landscaped grounds surrounding the estate will offer a unique and memorable dining experience in southern West Virginia."

"We think the upscale casual fine dining is a niche in Fayetteville that needs to be filled, so we're looking to provide that to the residents of this area as well as visitors," he added. "We're excited about it. It's something that we had contemplated for a while, then with Dobra Zupas closing it just made it something that we were ready to jump into.

"We have a beautiful lounge, beautiful grounds surrounding the restaurant. We'll be very unique in southern West Virginia because of the outdoor dining we'll be able to offer and just the atmosphere that we have. We think the public will really enjoy what we have to offer, and we're excited to open."

When The Gaines Estate took over catering its events in mid-2023, there were 12 weddings remaining in the year "that people were counting on us to provide catering, so we had to scramble." That led to the hiring of Blankenship and Lilly.

"To maintain a high-quality kitchen staff and server staff, it wasn't feasible to do that with just the 25-30 weddings we do a year," said Wells. "So, that's what prompted us to open up as a full-time restaurant."

As of next Friday, the lounge opens at 4 p.m., and restaurant patrons can dine from 5 to 10 p.m. Reservations are recommended. To make reservations or inquiries about meetings, events and weddings, call 304-382-7509.

Getting the estate back in operational mode over the years was a heavy lift, but it was a "labor of love," Wells said.

"It took us a while to restore it because it was in such bad shape," he said. "We're not big developers, so we had to finance it out of our pockets until we got our construction loan in December of 2018."

The 2008 fire damage was extensive. Among the replacement areas were many of the floors (although some original flooring remains), the bar area and second floor trusses. Work also had to be done on the roof, porches, windows, the arch piece for the front door and elsewhere. The blueprints for the original structure are displayed in the upstairs main dining area.

Wells said the fire damage was limited to the front third of the house, while the middle portion encountered heat damage, and the back third featured smoke and water damage.

The restoration, which included a "beautifully-designed lounge reminiscent of the Prohibition era" and a southern style patio, concluded in May 2020, and the first wedding was hosted in June 2020.