At Five Crowns, new look stays old
Five Crowns, the Corona del Mar steakhouse that’s reminiscent of an English inn, hosted a party Wednesday evening to unveil its recent renovations and new logo.
The East Coast Highway institution, which celebrated its 50th anniversary last year, has implemented changes inside and out. The work began last year.
Gone are the traditional white tablecloths. Now, diners eat on custom-made hardwood tabletops.
Gone is the back-of-the-house bar used by staff. Now it’s out in the open and has a new name: Cooper’s Bar, named after Chris Cooper, Five Crowns’ lead service bartender for 42 years who is retiring this month.
Cooper’s Bar overlooks Five Crowns’ famed greenhouse, which opened in 1972 as the first of its kind in Southern California. The greenhouse has some changes as well, including chandeliers, side chairs and a new communal table topped with thousands of English shillings.
Five Crowns installed new flooring in its three dining rooms that complement the refreshed and “vivid paint colors, eclectic wallpapers and fabrics,” according to a news release. The walls also have new adornments that continue Five Crowns’ legacy of giving patrons the feeling of being inside an English pub and inn.
Five Crowns hired local help for the exterior. Roger’s Gardens installed topiaries and boxwood hedges. There’s also a vegetable bed, plus lavender, rosemary, sage and citrus trees.
The red telephone booth is still in place near the entrance.
In addition to Roger’s Gardens, Five Crowns hired Hatch Design Group and Robinson Hill Architecture, both based in Costa Mesa, as well as YYES of Los Angeles for the project.
SideDoor, a gastropub that opened in 2010 in Five Crowns’ former lounge area, is remaining the same.
Richard Frank, president of Lawry’s Restaurants, the Pasadena-based company that owns Five Crowns, told guests at Wednesday’s event that the Corona del Mar institution “has a particular spot in our family.”
He said he hopes the new changes will maintain Five Crowns’ English-style heritage “but in a contemporary way.”
Frank’s father, Richard N. Frank, fell in love with English architecture in the early 1960s. He bought Hurley Bell, a replica of a 12th-century English inn at the corner of East Coast Highway and Poppy Avenue, and turned it into Five Crowns in 1965.
The name comes from the restaurant being the fifth “jewel” in Lawry’s “crown.”
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Bradley Zint, bradley.zint@latimes.com
Twitter: @BradleyZint
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