Downtown St. Petersburg will soon have twice the Mary Margaret’s: An expansion of the Irish pub is beginning this fall, eventually taking over the Top Slice Pizzeria space next door, owner and operator Pete Boland said in August.
Williams Park is St. Petersburg’s first park and encompasses an entire city block between Fourth and Third streets North and between Second and First avenues North. Mary Margaret’s, Top Slice Pizzeria and Black Cattle Burgers are all on the Third Street block.
Top Slice owner and operator Shan Bakrac decided tosell the lease to the Top Slice space to Boland and his partners so Mary Margaret’s can grow its footprint, he said.
“I have always admired the work he (Boland) has put into Mary Margaret’s and how much it has grown,” Bakrac said.
Bakrac will still have a pizza footprint on the block. Heplans to remodel Black Cattle Burgers, which he alsoowns a couple doors down, into a new chef-driven pizzeria. (It will retain some of the Black Cattle concept, though, so expect burgers on the menu, too.)
Inspired by the pizzerias owned and run by his aunts and uncles in Manhattan, Bakrac opened Top Slice in 2018.
“Growing up it was always something I wished I had and somehow it happened naturally without me looking for it,” he said Tuesday.
The interior at Mary Margaret’s Olde Irish Tavern, Wednesday, March 11, 2026 in St. Petersburg. The pub is expanding this fall and will take over the Top Slice Pizzeria space next door.
Mary Margaret’s was at a crisis of capacity, Boland said in August at the Irish pub with Victorian touches.
As he spoke, full kegs of Guinness were stacked two-high running the length of the hallway to the kitchen and bathrooms.
Boland pointed out that the kegs are just one day’s beer order. Mary Margaret’s is one of the top sellers of Guinness Draught in Florida, he said.
Bolandhas known for about five years that the roughly 1,600-square-foot space they have been navigating just isn’t big enough.
Fans look on at a packed Mary Margaret’s Irish pub that is just about standing room only. The downtown St. Petersburg pub is expanding this fall.
“We just have to turn away so many people so often it’ll be thrilling to be able to accommodate all the guests that want to taste, feel and enjoy the atmosphere of our authentic Irish pub experience,” he said.
In their seventh year he said they are “busting at the seams.”
Renderings of the forthcoming renovations show a bar window serving doubled patio space, a 10-seat bar inside, a 12-person large horseshoe-style booth, two restrooms.There will also be five “snugs,” a traditionally small screened-off confessional-style room attached to the bar where mainly women (or anyone that didn’t want to be seen drinking) would imbibe in early 20th-century Irish pubs that catered primarily to men.
A new doorway linking the two spaces will be on the connecting wall in the hallway that leads to the bathrooms and existing kitchen in Mary Margaret’s. Live music will still be performed on the stage inside the original bar.
Boland plans for renovations to begin October 1, and the expansion to be completed in January. Boland said Mary Margaret’s will remain open through the expansion.
Bakrac and Boland plan to coordinate a simultaneous closing date for Top Slice and Black Cattle. After Bakrac closes both spots and renovations begin at Mary Margaret’s, Bakrac said both spots plan to be open within two months of that closing date.
The block and buildings are part of Boland’s family history: Mary Margaret Prescott, the pub’s namesake, is his grandmother. She used to operate Claire’s Beauty Salon on the block in the 1970s.
“I want to be one of the old dead guys on the wall,” Boland said.
Food and drink served at Mary Margaret’s Olde Irish Tavern, Wednesday, March 11, 2026 in St. Petersburg.
29 Third St. N., St. Petersburg. marymargarets.com
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