After years working behind the scenes, Royal Tavern chef Nic Macri is opening his own Center City restaurant

After decades of opening and running restaurants for other people, chef Nic Macri and operations executive Suzanne O’Brien are becoming owners themselves.

The Royal Restaurant Group colleagues are joining cofounder Stephen Simons as partners in a still-unnamed Italian-inspired tavern planned for the former 1225 Raw space at 1225 Sansom St. in Washington Square West. It’s just steps off the 13th Street bar-restaurant cluster that includes El Vez, Prunella, Pearl & Mary, Double Knot, Vintage, Time, Barbuzzo, Darling Jack’s, and Little Gay Pub.

The project remains in the design stage, with demolition expected to begin shortly. Simons said a late April 2027 opening would be the best-case scenario, though it could take about a year.

For Macri, 41, the restaurant will be the big leap in a career that has taken him from his native Ontario to some of Philadelphia’s best-known kitchens and butcher shops. O’Brien, 58, has spent more than three decades opening and operating restaurants, including Dock Street Brewery, Cantina Los Caballitos, Royal Boucherie, and dancerobot, but has never before held an ownership stake.

Macri, the son of Calabrian immigrants who settled in the Toronto suburbs, came to Philadelphia on a Drexel University soccer scholarship. After cooking at Osteria and Southwark, he founded La Divisa Meats, the acclaimed Reading Terminal Market butcher shop that established him as one of the city’s premier charcutiers. He joined Royal Tavern as executive chef at its 2023 reopening from the pandemic shutdown.

The new restaurant will draw partly on Macri’s Sunday Sauce dinners at Royal, though he described the idea more broadly as “Philadelphia cooking with an Italian accent.”

“It won’t be rooted in one particular style or region,” he said. “It’s more about the Italian diaspora than one specific place.”

The menu will include fresh and dried pastas, house-made bread and salumi, preserved vegetables, and shareable large plates. Vegan dishes will be built around vegetables rather than meat substitutes.

One likely signature is a house-made mortadella sandwich on ciabatta, which Macri hopes can become the restaurant’s counterpart to Royal Tavern’s burger. His charcuterie program will focus on one featured item at a time rather than a large assortment.

“Especially if we’re making it ourselves, I want to highlight one thing and give people a chance to really enjoy it,” he said.

The beverage program is expected to include wines by the glass, a larger selection of Italian bottles, frozen cocktails, nonalcoholic drinks, and a small beer list. Desserts will likely include tiramisu and seasonal fruit tarts or crostatas.

Macri said the partnership offered a chance to take on more responsibility without moving away from the daily work of running a restaurant.

“I wanted to do something slightly larger and have more involvement than I do at Royal Tavern,” he said. “This seemed like the best opportunity for me to grow.”

He jokingly proposed calling it “Another Italian Restaurant,” an idea that did not survive.

“I don’t think they thought it was as funny as I did,” he said.

O’Brien brings deep operations background to the partnership. In 1991, she began waiting tables at the then-hotspot Metropolis — now the Fine Wine & Good Spirits store at 1515 Locust St. — and moved into management at the Palm and Cuba Libre before helping Simons and Frank build Royal Restaurant Group, whose holdings include Royal Sushi & Izakaya and Triangle Tavern. She is now the company’s CEO and said she would remain so.

“I’ve opened many restaurants, but this is the first one that’s actually mine,” she said. “It’s kind of funny.”

Macri was the deciding factor.

“I trust Nic,” O’Brien said. “He just likes really good food. It doesn’t have to be fancy, and he doesn’t try to make things into something they’re not. We’re very aligned on that.”

The restaurant will occupy the former 1225 Raw space and the adjoining former Sushi by Bou space, vacant since the city Revenue Department shut it down in early 2025 over tax and liquor-licensing issues surrounding the former operator, Glu Hospitality. The property extends a block to Chestnut Street, and will have about 100 indoor seats, a private dining room, and a courtyard and terrace that could accommodate about 40 more.

O’Brien, who oversees landscaping at several Royal properties, including the seasonal PHS pop-ups, said the outdoor space and the building’s historic character would help shape the design. Ambit Architecture, which worked with Royal on dancerobot, is handling the project.

The partners envision a restaurant priced between Royal Tavern and Royal Boucherie, with enough flexibility for a casual weeknight dinner, a date, or a family meal.

“It’s going to be fun,” O’Brien said. “It’s the kind of place where you might come a couple of times a week, bring your mom to dinner one night, or go on a date another night.”