{"id":324078,"date":"2026-06-05T13:12:09","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T13:12:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/324078\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T13:12:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T13:12:09","slug":"barn-door-to-be-demolished-soluna-to-open-in-spring-2028","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/324078\/","title":{"rendered":"Barn Door to be demolished, Soluna to open in spring 2028"},"content":{"rendered":"

The historic Barn Door Restaurant and Meat Market, a recently-closed steakhouse<\/a> that opened in 1953, will be bulldozed next month to make way for Soluna<\/a>, a popular Mexican restaurant on Broadway.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to tear the Barn Door down and build from the ground up,\u201d said Gerardo Calvillo,\u00a0general manager of Mamita\u2019s Cuisine, Inc., which owns Soluna and El Mirasol restaurants. \u201cWe\u2019re hoping to start demolition within the next month. But those details are still kind of up in the air right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Barn Door sits on a 1.6-acre lot formerly owned by the Strauss family<\/a> in Alamo Heights, a property valued at $1.9 million, according to Bexar Central Appraisal District. <\/p>\n

It will take time to demolish and rebuild.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cWe plan on opening for Fiesta 2028,\u201d Calvillo said.<\/p>\n

According to the general manager, Soluna has two years remaining on its current lease, less than a mile from the new lot. Gerardo Calvillo and his brother, Mamita\u2019s Cuisine owner Jesse Calvillo, plan to build a two-story restaurant with an upper rooftop bar and kitchen, a main dining room downstairs and two patios.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re still working with architects,\u201d Gerardo Calvillo said.<\/p>\n

The Barn Door closed on Mother\u2019s Day, May 10, after 72 years. <\/p>\n

Before the steakhouse served its final customers, he told the San Antonio Report that Soluna would move into the space known for grilled ribeyes, chicken fried steak and red-checkered table cloths.<\/p>\n

Randy Stokes, former Barn Door owner, could not be reached for comment. In an April 27 social media post announcing the closing, the Barn Door wrote, \u201cYou welcomed us into your traditions. You trusted us with your milestones. You filled our dining rooms with life, and you made The Barn Door what it became. We have been through so much together, and it has truly been the privilege of a lifetime to serve this city the steaks you have come to love.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barn Door was known as a place where big deals were brokered and finalized. It was inside the iconic steakhouse in 1984 where developer\u00a0Marty Wender<\/a>\u00a0closed a deal to sell the land on which Sea World was built.<\/p>\n

\"\"The Barn Door restaurant closed on May 10, 2026. Credit: Jasper Kenzo Sundeen \/ San Antonio Report<\/p>\n

The Calvillo brothers are sons of Jesse and Carmen Calvillo, who founded La Fogata Mexican Restaurant<\/a> in 1979. It was there that Jesse Calvillo Sr. created his own take on a skinny margarita, a famous San Antonio cocktail known as the chispa<\/a>.<\/p>\n

After selling La Fogata to new ownership in 1997, the first of three family-run El Mirasol restaurants opened in 1998. The family opened Soluna in 2003.<\/p>\n

Five years ago, the Calvillo brothers began looking to relocate, largely to accommodate the demand for more parking. The Barn Door property, they learned, became available over the past year.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe weren\u2019t sure if they wanted to pull the trigger or not, and they finally did,\u201d Gerardo Calvillo said. \u201cWe closed about a week and a half ago.\u201d<\/p>\n

The recent transaction stirred memories. Gerardo Calvillo remembers dining at The Barn Door in his youth.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d go there for birthdays with friends,\u201d he said. \u201cYou\u2019d have your name on the billboard. I\u2019m very proud of the move and the opportunity to take over such a historic area.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Soluna on Broadway holds memories, as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cI worked with my dad there,\u201d he said. \u201cI met my wife (Alexis) there. She was a customer. I went in there the other day by myself and started looking around. So many memories after 23 years. It\u2019s kind of bittersweet.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The historic Barn Door Restaurant and Meat Market, a recently-closed steakhouse that opened in 1953, will be bulldozed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":324079,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[107423,115894,115895,115896,115897,82,84,83,115898,115899,92,3028,6251],"class_list":["post-324078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-barn-door","tag-chispa","tag-el-mirasol","tag-gerardo-calvillo","tag-la-fogata-mexican-restaurant","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-soluna","tag-the-barn-door-restaurant-and-meat-market","tag-top-story","tag-typedaily","tag-wc-500-750"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324078"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324078\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/324079"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}