A Restaurant Built In Quarantine: Prospect Heights' Newest Eatery

PROSPECT HEIGHTS, BROOKLYN — Restauranteur Randi Lee was a few months from opening his first solo restaurant in Prospect Heights — a dream, in many ways, 25 years in the making — when the coronavirus pandemic hit New York City.

Soon, the construction manager he'd hired to make over the Dean Street eatery headed to Canada to check on family, his landlord came down with the coronavirus and New York's restaurant industry had all but shuttered.

Lee started thinking of an "exit strategy," wondering if he should abandon his dream altogether.

But instead, he got to work.

"The only reasonable thing I could think of was to start building out the restaurant on our own since all we had was time on our hands," he wrote in a GoFundMe started last month.

Only allowed to have one or two people working in the restaurant at a time under New York's stay-at-home order, Lee spent his quarantine renovating the 755 Dean St. space with only the help of his fiancé, a friend and a painter.

The makeshift crew laid 1,000 square feet of tile, refinished the floors, built banquettes, refinished the bar and began reimagining his business plan for a post-COVID world.

"...While the world seemed to stand still, I was slowly building a restaurant with my own hands," Lee wrote.

(Courtesy of Leland).

The experience was a new one even for Lee, who has worked with some of the top names in the restaurant industry during his 25-year career working in, managing and consulting for restaurants in three cities.

"My head was all over the place," Lee told Patch. "Every morning I was like, 'What can I get done today just to move forward.' This [restaurant] is not just a part of me — this is me."

The new restaurant — to be called Leland Eating and Drinking House after his great uncle — is Lee's first independent project and has officially been in the works for about two years.

Lee's career in the food business started two decades ago when he took on restaurant jobs as a way to make extra cash for art school in Portland, Ore.

Soon, he got "the bug" for the restaurant industry and was spending full days, now in Chicago, working with James Beard Award-winning Chef Tony Mantuano while spending nights in his art studio.

As his career moved to New York City, Lee would work with Joe Bastianich, Mario Batali and at the Spotted Pig managing before moving to consulting for The Smile group.

(Courtesy of Leland).

Now, he's hoping to pair that industry knowledge with his own vision of a comfortable neighborhood spot at Leland. The restaurant, he says, will aim to capture the Danish state of comfort known as "hygge."

"You can imagine a nice bowl of soup, really nice jazz, a nice book by a fire," Lee said. "When we open up our doors here we want this to be an extension of our home. We want it to be where people can come and gather."

That vision hit another curveball, though, as New York City started reopening and restaurants were rendered outdoors to help stop the spread of the virus.

"Pre-COVID, I never dreamed I would be able to have outdoor dining," Lee wrote. "Then, all around, restaurants were erecting makeshift platforms on the streets, sidewalks and in parking spaces in an effort to create outdoor dining spaces where none existed previously."

Again, Lee got to work.

The restauranteur realized that the exterior of Leland would be just as, if not more, important than the inside he'd been focusing on.

He made a plan to replace all 16 windows that wrap around the corner restaurant so they can open up, install three awnings, paint the outside, take out a gate over the entrance and buy outdoor furniture to make a sidewalk dining set-up.

"We want this to be a magical corner," Lee said. "We want to make the corner feel like it’s part of the restaurant — on the hottest day you can feel cool, on the coolest day you can feel comfortable and warm."

The GoFundMe aims to raise $30,000 so that plan can come to life.

(Courtesy of Leland).

So far, it has raised more than $17,000. Lee said watching the donations roll in — both from family or friends and the Prospect Heights community — has been one of the most rewarding parts of the journey.

"Every one of these people are my clients, my friends and part of my community," he said.

Leland will open its doors once all renovations are complete and final things, like securing a liquor license, are crossed off the list, Lee said.

And, despite how that to-do list has changed and will continue to change, Lee will have one thing for certain: an answer to the question, 'What did you do during quarantine?'

"Some people will say, 'I baked bread, I did a garden,'" he said. "And some are going to say, 'Hey, I built a restaurant to serve the community.'"

(Courtesy of Leland). Lee stands outside the restaurant with his mom.

This article originally appeared on the Prospect Heights-Crown Heights Patch