Old Hanny's department store now hip restaurant

Restaurants in downtown Phoenix usually have to win over fans.

Often they're small, independent nightspots - artsy bars and restaurants tucked into historical homes, or slick nightclubs retrofitted into old brick buildings.

But when Hanny's the restaurant moved into the old Hanny's department store at First and Adams streets, it represented the first destination restaurant to open downtown. It's near Sky Lounge, Bar Smith, PHX Nightclub and Majerle's Sports Grill.

Foodies, nightlife insiders and neighborhood residents have been waiting for Karl Kopp to open Hanny's. The owner of Scottsdale's ever-fashionable AZ88 originally announced plans three years ago. Almost two years after the first proposed opening date, the soft opening was the first week of November.

After city-code struggles, rehab setbacks and design adjustments, the space is now a stark, modernist take on midcentury design - all concrete and leather and glass. With vaulted ceilings, an undulating second-story balcony and lower walls of plate glass on two sides, it's designed to show off the patrons within, just as the store's clothing once did.

"I like things where the people are the decor," said Kopp, who also owns Elsa's on the Park in Milwaukee and Bar 89 in Manhattan's SoHo neighborhood. (In 1996, Bar 89 won a James Beard restaurant-design award and a New York Landmarks Preservation Commission award for its interior design.)

"Every night, there's a new show . . . because the people change," Kopp said.

With that attitude and the help of Janis Leonard of Scottsdale's Janis Leonard Design Associates, Hanny's is as clever as AZ88, for which Leonard does seasonal art installations.

The bathrooms are even more buzz-worthy than the neon ones people talk about in Old Town, and everything from the purple-leather tongue couches (yes, tongues) to the glass-topped elevator shaft is more idiosyncratic than what Kopp has done previously in Arizona. The menu of cracker-crust pizzas, sandwiches and wine is distinct from AZ88's.

"It's a good addition," said landscape architect Jeff Lothner, 27, of Phoenix, who recently was having pizza and wine with a friend at one of the über-private rectangular booths upstairs. "They're trying to bring a different crowd than what's already downtown."

The building

Built in 1947, this branch of the Hanny's department stores was a go-to place for Valley residents looking for sophisticated men's fashions. It closed in 1986; the last Hanny's store closed in 1994.

Attorney Grady Gammage Jr. remembers when people used to shop in Hanny's on their lunch hour. He talks about buying a stylish suit from the store in 1978, as a young attorney. It was faux denim, with epaulets and wide lapels.

"It's not a look I'd be willing to try now," Gammage joked.

Although the fashions Hanny's once sold are passe, the distinct concrete building is not. In fact, the International Style building is architecturally significant, with curves and bands of windows, according to Debbie Abele, a Phoenix historical-preservation officer from 1989-98.

In its day, it was a state-of-the-art retail space, said Abele, who consulted on the renovations, which cost $5 million.

After Hanny's closed, the building was repeatedly set afire for the training of city firefighters. There later was talk later of razing it.

Meanwhile, Kopp owned a downtown building that he wanted to use for a restaurant, but Phoenix wanted it for part of Arizona State University's downtown campus. So Kopp and the city swapped buildings, and he was given nearly $370,000 in preservation funds to repair the roof. Still, the Hanny's building had no plumbing or electricity, and it bore the scars of fire and neglect.

The rebirth

On the outside, Hanny's looks much as it once did. The building is still a nondescript beige, and the flecked red-and-manila stone composite sign is still set into the sidewalk on First Street.

Passers-by could mistake the restaurant as being still under construction. Leonard has left rough and unfinished the concrete wall that once backed the display windows. But the others are filled with low couches on which patrons can serve as living, cocktailing mannequins.

Inside, Leonard has refurbished the original antique world maps that hung at the top of the south wall. On the upper north wall, a restored sign advertises such designer labels as Christian Dior and Nino Cerruti. The sign for menswear designers Hart Schaffner and Marx is missing Schaffner's first "f." It's been like that "forever," says Kopp, who didn't think he should be the one to correct it.

But the rest of the 250-seat restaurant is sharp and minimalist. Concrete and greige-painted walls create an austere space. Servers wear white cropped coats that look vaguely pharmaceutical. A glossy, cherry-colored Berkel meat slicer dominates the square, steel-topped bar, the lone spot of color in the room.

But the main attractions are these: the empty elevator shaft that has been finished with mirrors on the floor one story below; and the ceiling three stories above the main dining room. Guests stand on a see-through floor and clearly are delighted by the resulting feeling of vertigo, judging by the shrieks and laughter. Upstairs is a white room, lit red and blue and featuring doors without knobs. One is for men and two are unisex; the rest aren't labeled, leaving users to infer that inside the periwinkle-tiled rooms are mirrors, toilets and sinks.

There are many other clever touches, including a beauty hallway, but most people will really come here to eat and drink. For them, there's a 27-bottle wine list, with by-the-glass offerings priced from $7 to $11, and bottles from $35 to $99. Smaller pours and 12 cocktails are $5 to $10. Petite pizzas dominate the brief food menu, starting at $9, depending on the number and type of toppings. There also are four salads and four sandwiches.

Shannon Bryant, 45, of Phoenix, has been peering through the windows at Hanny's on her lunch breaks.

On a recent Friday night, she was at the bar for the second time that week.

"I think it's wonderful," Bryant said. "It's really going to take off. Everyone at the office is already talking about that elevator shaft."

Hanny's opened its doors in 1947, and until 1986 it was the place to go for stylish men's fashions.