since the news was revealed by the Herald on Tuesday<\/a>. <\/p>\n![\"Co-owner]()
Co-owner Brett Simeti says he feels like he is losing a part of his home with the bar’s doors closing soon. Photo \/ Annaleise Shortland<\/p>\n
\u201cI was up there for quite some time yesterday afternoon and evening, so I could front up to all our lovely customers. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey wanted to share their support, love and solidarity, which was really lovely. It was genuine, heartfelt and very humbling.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe emotions people were conveying made me realise even more than I already did the effect the Gypsy has had on people\u2019s lives, their relationships and their connection with the community,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
\u201cThere\u2019s a real emotional connection there.\u201d<\/p>\n
A \u201creal positive\u201d from the news being shared was the offers Simeti had received from people about potential new locations for Gypsy. <\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve certainly had people reaching out with some definitive options for me to look at, which I\u2019m working my way through at the moment.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Barfoot]()
Barfoot & Thompson director Stephen Barfoot has acknowledged the Gypsy Tea Room\u2019s iconic status and says the decision to redevelop the property was not made lightly. Photo \/ Annaleise Shortland<\/p>\n
His workers were \u201cstunned\u201d when they heard the news, which was broken to them before the public was told. <\/p>\n
Simeti employs 11 staff across Gypsy and his other location in Herne Bay, Elbow Room, and expects he will have to reduce his workforce by about 50%.<\/p>\n
There had been \u201cwhisperings\u201d about the closure, and some customers had asked staff for confirmation over the past few weeks, Simeti said, but the news still came as a shock.<\/p>\n
However, Simeti said his staff\u2019s reactions \u201csurprised and humbled\u201d him. <\/p>\n
\u201cTheir main concern was Gypsy. Their love for the place and their connection to it really came through, along with their pledge of support and willingness to help us move forward from this. <\/p>\n
\u201cIt was amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n
![\"Brett]()
Brett Simeti employs 11 staff across Gypsy Tea Room and his other venue in Herne Bay, Elbow Room, and expects he will have to reduce his workforce by about 50%. Photo \/ Annaleise Shortland<\/p>\n
The bar\u2019s owners lodged a caveat in 2018 to uphold a verbal lease agreement with the previous owners. But Simeti said the caveat was withdrawn \u201cin good faith\u201d the following year, with hopes the property would be sold to someone happy to continue the lease arrangement.<\/p>\n
He said when the property was sold to Barfoot & Thompson in October 2021, it was \u201call roses and flowers\u201d until discussions began about potential redevelopment of the site.<\/p>\n
Barfoot & Thompson told the Herald it had been honest with Gypsy about the plans.<\/p>\n
The company had \u201cpreviously spoken about our desire to breathe new life into the building by restoring, protecting and renovating its existing historic features and expanding the footprint to include new retail and commercial office space\u201d.<\/p>\n
Simeti said he held on to hope and continued to engage with Barfoot but had refused the company\u2019s offer to move the bar next door.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt just would not be the same. This place is our home, not next door.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rachel Maher is an investigative reporter covering Auckland issues and education. She started at the Herald as a breaking news journalist in 2022, before joining the Auckland team this year.<\/p>\n
Sign up to The Daily H<\/a>, a free newsletter curated by our editors and delivered straight to your inbox every weekday. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Barfoot & Thompson director Stephen Barfoot acknowledged the bar\u2019s iconic status and said the decision was not made…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":437120,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[74,806,3952,6128,1558,682,17163,178366,33452,15356,679,71,52088,90867,1345,43878,16569,78,101,39084,23300,3025,117,111,43,139,69,8617,97461,36097,16784,312,1886,27319,24358],"class_list":["post-437119","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-after","tag-as","tag-aucklands","tag-bars","tag-been","tag-being","tag-closure","tag-coowner","tag-devastated","tag-emerged","tag-forced","tag-from","tag-grey","tag-gypsy","tag-home","tag-humbled","tag-iconic","tag-in","tag-left","tag-location","tag-lynn","tag-most","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-offers","tag-patrons","tag-roll","tag-room","tag-says","tag-support","tag-tea","tag-wave"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437119","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=437119"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/437119\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/437120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=437119"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=437119"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=437119"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}