French Fare Blossoms at Fleur’s

1. Fleur’s owners have known each other for more than a decade.

This isn’t Sabatino, Gernsheimer, or Mann’s first time working together — or in the neighborhood. Both Gernsheimer and Mann started working in Fishtown and Kensington back in 2011. Gernsheimer was an assistant manager in East Kensington, opening Loco Pez nearby on East Norris Street. At the same time, Mann opened Frankford Hall under restaurateur Stephen Starr, and eventually hired Gernsheimer as a manager in 2015.

When Mann became director of operations for Safran Turney Hospitality, he began working closely alongside Sabatino, the group’s then-culinary director. They hit it off, and Sabatino’s work ethic and cooking sensibilities, coupled with Mann’s leadership style and hunger for fostering a more collaborative restaurant culture, just clicked.

“[The] daily grind of managing and running other people’s restaurants pushed us into actively looking for a space where we could do our own thing,” Mann says.

“There are no French restaurants on this side of town,” adds Sabatino. For him, opening Fleur’s feels extra special, as this will be the first time he’s owned a restaurant and not cooked someone else’s food since leaving his first restaurant, Aldine in Rittenhouse, back in 2018. Plus, he’s now a Kensington neighbor. “It’s a privilege to get to know people in your neighborhood through the lens of hospitality.”

Now, they all get to be part of the neighborhood’s future. “I want to hire people who want my job. If you walk through the door every day with ambition and potential, I will put you in a position to grow and develop,” says Gernsheimer. He recalls having this conversation early on with Mann, and it’s since become an ethos for promoting his restaurant workers from within.

2. It’s where French Art Deco sensibility meets a historic Philly landmark.

Fleur’s team toured around 40 properties in Philadelphia before falling in love with the former Fluehr’s Fine Furniture building, a family-run showroom and warehouse established in 1888. “It had so much character, history, and potential,” says Gernsheimer. “Having the opportunity to bring it back from an abandoned state with adaptive reuse had a ton of appeal to us.”

It’s taken three years to restore the one-time tallest building on the block, preserving as many of its original 19th-century architectural details as possible — the restaurant’s logo honors one of Fluehr’s original light fixtures — while modernizing it as a multi-purpose space.

The 14,000-square-foot property, stretching from Front to Emerald Streets, will open first with Fleur’s, which boasts two levels with a 130-seat dining room, an 18-seat bar, and an eight-seat raw bar where clams and oysters from Local 130 Seafood, Small World Seafood, and Samuels & Sons are shucked to order, as well as an upper mezzanine. Later, the building will also be home to a boutique six-room hotel, a fifth-floor event space with its own kitchen, a rooftop bar, and another dozen seats in a private dining room. That’s where Sabatino envisions hosting tasting menus or family-style meals, or a space that doubles as a “teaching or learning kitchen to workshop new dishes.”

The décor inside Fleur’s channels “French Art Deco sensibility” in classic Philly style through chandelier pendants, high tin-coated ceilings, curved walls, arched back bar shelves, exposed brick, and large windows. Local designer Lisa A. Calabro, whom Mann met while she was designing Frankford Hall, played a crucial role in executing a design vision that complements the building’s showroom origins footprint. The result is a “light, bright, expansive” plant-filled, French-Mediterranean open-floor plan, done in soft pinks and emerald greens.

And drawing on the restaurant’s namesake, which is French for “flower,” you’ll also spot floral motifs throughout the dining room, bar, and mezzanine.

“We wanted to make sure that when you walk into the space from Front Street, it just feels like you’re walking into this grand space that has a real sense of gravity and height,” says Mann.

“This property has a spirit, a je ne sais quoi, that tells its own story,” says Gernsheimer.

3. The menu is classically French, but a touch lighter than you might expect.

Sabatino’s background as a private chef and farmhand will translate to a lighter, vegetable-forward, French-inspired menu. While he may be best known for cooking Italian and Mediterranean cuisine, he’s exploring a “less is more” culinary direction at Fleur’s, with dishes presented simply.

He’s taken inspiration from rustic cookbooks, plus support from Christopher Kearse of Forsythia in Old City, and mentorship by the late David Ansell of Pif (now home to the Italian eatery Paffuto) to pursue this style of cooking.

“I think it’s interesting for me to explore where France has influenced other cuisines, and where other cuisines can be found in French cooking,” says Sabatino. The result is an unexpected menu that balances tradition with innovation, employing well-known French dishes as a foundation to develop flavors and incorporate Sabatino’s passion for preservation and fermentation. Sabatino has been quietly collaborating with fellow Philadelphia chef Tim Dearing of Ūle on Fleur’s fermentation program to develop sweet potato miso, fermented allium powder, koji, and amazake for the restaurant.

“Learning how to preserve what’s in season now to use it later on is probably the biggest cooking tip I brought from Aldine [to Fleur’s],” says Sabatino. He’s always liked pickling ingredients, learning how to use them in the best way, and thanks to purveyors like Greenflash Farms near Princeton, N.J., where Sabatino worked in recent years, Fleur’s menu also aligns with the Mid-Atlantic’s micro-seasons.

Highlights include a sea scallop gratin, made with scallops brined in a miso-cream corn, and finished with fermented lemon juice and a drizzle of lobster roe oil. Sabatino pickles fresh mackerel before it gets torched for a play on the French classic of “fish and oil,” pairing it with dashi potatoes and pickled vegetables. Instead of leeks vinaigrette, Fleur’s has mussels vinaigrette, with steamed mussels placed atop a deep-fried shredded pavé, given a generous sprinkle of fermented allium powder.

A Caesar-inspired salad tossed in an anchovy beurre blanc substitutes broccolini for romaine, and adds sourdough croutons fried in clarified butter. A grilled eight-ounce Denver steak dressed in spoonfuls of cognac au poivre and Thai chile sauce vierge is paired with fries dusted in garlic powder and Espelette pepper. And, in an ode to English chef Fergus Henderson’s (St. John) roast bone marrow and parsley salad, Sabatino adds fermented pepper mash and housemade giardiniera to beef tartare.

Sabatino isn’t skimping on housemade pastries, either. Pain au chocolat with foie, anyone? Sabatino’s version includes caramelized white chocolate and a sour cherry marmalade. He’s also got a French vanilla custard with gluten-free hazelnut crumble and peaches, as well as a baked-to-order maple soufflé with yuzu créme anglaise and plum preserves. And in terms of bread, South Philly’s Mighty Bread sourdough gets served table side with an ever-changing house-cultured butter.

“I’m not trying to reinvent the wheel, I want to build something here that will last for a long time,” says Sabatino.

Fleur’s will be open for dinner daily from 5 to 10 p.m. starting September 12.

Alisha Miranda is a food and travel journalist and #LatinxIndustryNight cultural producer based in Philadelphia. Follow her on Instagram. Follow Resy, too.

Aaron Richter is a Philadelphia-based photographer who has shot for The New York Times, Esquire, The Times of London, and many other outlets. He also hosts “A Shot” podcast. Follow him on Instagram. Follow Resy, too.