Fenwick’s balances nostalgia and relevance— and has for more than three decades
PURPLE NEON LIGHTS run along the roof line at Fenwick’s, a noticeable departure in this well-manicured neighborhood. Without the lights, the restaurant might otherwise look more like one of the houses off this busy stretch of Providence Road.
Before it was Fenwick’s, the restaurant was a breakfast joint. It started out as a Dobb’s House in the 1960s and later became part of the Steak and Eggs franchise. Independent restaurateurs purchased and renovated the restaurant in the early 1980s, giving it its current name. They put it up for sale just a few months later.
Don and Catherine Rabb, meanwhile, were working at a popular spot across town called Shenanigan’s. Don, a professional musician, had left New Orleans to help his friend open and run the restaurant. Says Catherine about her role: “I was a very green sometimes-line cook, sometimes-server.”
The young couple was trying to figure out what to do next when the two visited Fenwick’s for lunch one day. A week or two later, they learned it was for sale.
It felt like a manageable size. They could do this, they thought. So they did.
Unable to afford a new sign or other updates, they kept the name and much of the décor, but overhauled the menu. They opened the doors in August 1984, just 10 months after their wedding.
“We were, of course, too young to think it through,” Catherine says.
This story is from the March 2017 edition of Charlotte Magazine.
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This story is from the March 2017 edition of Charlotte Magazine.
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