The fate of one of the most emblematic restaurants along Pacific Coast Highway is in Limbo months after its destruction in the Palisades fire of January, but on one face, California State Parks says it will work to allow the Reel Inn to rebuild in or near its original site.
The seafood cabin cover hung in colorful Christmas lights and decorated with aquariums, surf boards and other nautical Bric-A-Brac served more than 1,100 meals in their busiest days, and attracted generations of locals, surfers and tourists for almost 40 years in its location on the earth road from the road from the beach of Topanga.
Following the fire of Palisades, which also destroyed the reference points of the Moonshadows, Cholada Thai and other businesses in PCH, the owners of husbands and wife Andy Leonard and Teddy Seraphine-Leonard immediately said that they hoped to rebuild. While they have recently weighed the reopening of Reel Inn elsewhere, their first option is to return to the original house and a lifetime of the restaurant at the Topanga base. But without a clear timeline of the State, that possibility remains opaque.
“There is not a single person in charge of this project,” Leonard said. “It is one of those 400 heads monsters. We do not know any bad boy in the state parks, but it is like entering the post office and asking for a pizza.”
They had owned the building, but rented the State of the State and expected to participate in discussions about their future. In early August, as reported by the Wall Street JournalThe owners received a letter from the parks and recreation department of California who said they could not rebuild on the land plot, but that they could have the opportunity to offer against other dealers to temporarily administer a close food truck.
Leonard told The Times that he had taken the answer as “a high middle finger.”
Steamed clams in Reel Inn, photographed in 2024.
(Stephanie Breijo / Los Angeles Times)
Social networks illuminated with angry comments and general protests in the result. The option not only of operating a food truck but also having to offer for the opportunity, Leonard said, he felt insulting. The cost of buying the truck, renting a curator cuisine and allowing the operation could cost more than $ 100,000, and ultimately would only be temporary, if they won the tender process to start.
Then, at the beginning of September, the California state parks sent Leonard and Seraphine-Leonard a new letter “to reaffirm our commitment to carefully explore a forward path that makes it possible for Reel Inn to prosper in the property of state parks.”
“Some of the recent communications of the department with the Leonards may not have completely transmitted our values and intention to associate with them,” said Marty Greenstein, Deputy Director of Communications of California State Parks, to The Times by email.
Last week, the state parks of California told The Times that the agency is now working with the governor Gavin Newsom office and local philanthropic groups “to rebuild the infrastructure lost on the site.”
“As the financing ensures,” said the representative, “our intention is to bring back the Inn reel and the other busy businesses as key tenants.”
After the update of the parks department, Leonard said: “The possibility is now brilliant.”
A first diner is established for lunch in Reel Inn in March 2024.
(Silvia Razgova / for the times)
Representatives have not yet provided a timeline to return to the site, an idea of what could be the next steps or how the restaurant could play in the reurbed lot.
“They think that Reel Inn is as great as canned beer, and they really want to make good life for everyone,” said Leonard, “but they have absolutely any idea of how the time or reality of that would look.”
The location of Reel Inn near the Topanga lagoon is historic: the plot of the Earth has served as Rodeo Grounds, a small residential enclave and innumerable places of filming. The structure of Reel Inn housed multiple seafood restaurants before Leonard, now 77 years old, took possession of Reel Inn after a race photographing and recording the Grateful Dead and possessing a nightclub in New York City.
When the fire crossed the Palisades and the portions of Topanga and Pacific Coast Highway, Reel Inn owners had approximately one month in their lease. But they also had “a handshake agreement with state parks for an extension of several years that [they] I never saw on paper, “according to Leonard.
After the fire demolished the restaurant, and more than 30 structures in the Topanga State Park and the Historical Park of the State of Will Rogers, the space became a central center for local and federal agencies, such as the Army Corps of Engineers, when the teams began the extraction of debris in the burns sites.
An exterior of the Inn Reel, photographed in 2024. Its neon signage, which presented “jumping” red fish, became an iconic milestone along PCH.
(Silvia Razgova / for the times)
Leonard and Seraphine-Leonard hoped that they could continue the discussion when these agencies vacated the stretch of land, but then saw that the Los Angeles Water and Power Department erected temporary and closer buildings while rebuilding and reconnecting their services affected by the fire.
When the restorers received the news that the State would cancel the restaurant lease, they asked if the decision was linked to the restoration project of the Topanga Lagoon has long planned. The extensive project would rebuild the nearby PCH bridge, and multiple plans for the reel Inn lands were proposed, including the possible demolition or renewal for a concessionaire.
“Due to these changes [fires] On the site, state parks plan to reassess/review opportunities for visiting services “, the Last project update saying. “Public meetings will be held in the fall of 2025”, but the plans now “use a part of this space to provide accommodation during the low cost night, as well as improved visitors.”
“Ninety -nine percent of people who do this project have never been to Reel Inn,” Leonard said.
The family has considered the reopening elsewhere and has been approached to open new locations in Los Angeles and Orange County, as well as merge with other restaurants or assume existing leases, but a beach location historically worked better for the concept of affordable seafood.
The diners dig at lunch in the courtyard of Reel Inn.
(Silvia Razgova / for the times)
“We have had four Reel inns,” Leonard said. “We have been in shopping centers. We were on the third street walk for 13 years. It works much better on the beach because the food is cheap, it is really good. It is that type of sawdust on the floor, and it cannot be done in a shopping center.”
Their children have someday offer to administer the inn, in case it is rebuilt, but more immediately they are discussing a kitchen book.
The family plans to publish the Reel Inn recipes, which originally met decades as the restaurant grew with multiple locations. I would detail how to make your secret sauces, spices mixtures, special seafood and more.
PCH Seafood Stalwart The Reel Inn served market style fish dinners with freshly collected fillets from the seafood box.
(Stephanie Breijo / Los Angeles Times)
During the fire thousands of fans, including multigenerational meal shots in the patio, and a girlfriend who had a complete living room in space after their wedding. It turned out to be a favorite restaurant of innumerable Angels, including former vice president Kamala Harris, who chose that place as the place to meet her future stepdaughter for the first time. These stories, Leonard said, could be easily included for a kitchen book that is also part of the yearbook.
Fans can also see bottles of the spicy sauce of homemade chipotle inn in the future.
And, one day, the restaurant could return: ideally in its original location, but maybe in a new place. If it is rebuilt, it could present more space in the kitchen or other adjustments that were not allowed in the previous decades.
“We don't know what will happen. He will reveal himself,” Leonard said. “But we really feel quite strongly, we have to do something. It is inappropriate in our minds simply letting the reel inn become and die.”
