Restaurateur eyes Phillips' City Dock location

The owner of an award-winning restaurant in Washington, D.C., is planning to take over the Phillips Seafood restaurant on City Dock.

In Phillips' place, award-winning restaurateur and chef Robert Kinkead would open a new restaurant called Hell Point Seafood at the 12 Dock St. location.

Mr. Kinkead has owned several high-end restaurants, featuring mainly American dishes in the mid-Atlantic region since the 1980s.

Tomorrow, during the meeting of the city Alcoholic Beverage Control Board, the board will debate whether it should transfer Phillips' liquor license to the new eatery.

Calls to Mr. Kinkead and his Annapolis-based attorney, Charles F. Delevan, were not returned.

Esquire magazine named Mr. Kinkead's Twenty-One Federal restaurant on L Street in downtown Washington, D.C., as one of the 25 best new restaurants when it opened in 1987.

That restaurant closed in 1993 after its owners filed for bankruptcy, according to news reports.

Mr. Kinkead also owned a restaurant in Vienna, Va., called Colvin Run Tavern, which closed in 2007.

Mr. Kinkead currently operates an American cuisine restaurant on Pennsylvania Avenue in the Foggy Bottom neighborhood of Washington, D.C., called Kinkead's.

In 2007, Washingtonian magazine ranked Kinkead's the 17th best restaurant in the area.

With his brother, David, Mr. Kinkead also owns a Boston restaurant called Sibling Rivalry.

Mr. Kinkead and his business partner, Annapolis-based kitchen designer James Russell Stilwell, were previously looking to open a restaurant at the site of the old Arundel Rug store on West Street and Spa Road.

That plan stalled when a couple of Murray Hill residents blocked a parking agreement.

It would have waived a requirement that the new owners construct enough parking, about 80 spaces, on the 14,000-square-foot property.

Chuck Walsh, the owner of the West Street site who was hoping to lease the building to Mr. Kinkead and his group, said Mr. Kinkead " … is first class. Top of the line, quality. Not just (Mr. Kinkead) but (James) Russ Stilwell and the people who run his businesses. Just quality people."

The Phillips building opened in 1960 as the popular, one-story Harbour House Restaurant in the neighborhood formerly known as Hell Point.

Its owner, George Phillips, who is not related to or involved with the Phillips Seafood franchise, sold the building in 1995 to Raimondo Lubrano, who opened his own seafood restaurant called Vespucci's.

Mr. Lubrano sold the building in 1999 to the Ocean City-based Phillips Seafood chain, which also has restaurants in Baltimore, Washington, D.C., Philadelphia and Myrtle Beach.

Today, the building is valued at just less than $3 million, according to state property records.

Calls to Phillips executives were not returned before press time.

In its application to takeover the liquor license, the Kinkead group indicates that it would eliminate the outdoor seating area of the restaurant.

Architects for the planned National Sailing Hall of Fame that will be built next door have discussed the possibility of incorporating part of the Phillips building into its museum. However, the museum's design still is in the works.