At the time of the coronavirus measures, many restaurants suffered an unfortunate fate. Empty spaces, on the other hand, gave the opportunity for new interesting places. Jakub Odstrčil from the Engel & Völkers Commercial Rental team found a new tenant for one of the abandoned restaurants. Read an interview with Petr Racek, the owner of a beautiful historic house in Braník. New Greek restaurant Taverna Margarita has been located since November 2021 on the ground floor of the house.
The restaurant was here 100 years ago. In the fifties, the house was nationalized, a new gastronomic operation, a pizzeria, was restored here later. My dad was a photographer and had a photo studio on the ground floor of the house, we broke through the rooms and as you can see today, a big integrated space was created. Visitors can notice different types of floors in the place where the wall used to be.
The previous tenant resigned due to the coronavirus pandemic, a number of visitors was really low. The structure of customers has completely changed. People were often working at the home office and went for lunch at their place of residence. For example Tte employees of the “Branický Theater”, used to be frequent visitors, but the theatre was closed for a long time due to the pandemic.
Your colleague Jiří Trojan from The Commercial Sales team contacted me. I did not want to sell the house, but I let him to make an analysis of the whole house. We stayed in touch, then when I had one of the apartments available, your colleague from The Residential Rental team, Dominik Brabec, helped me find a tenant with whom I am satisfied. Now I have entrusted the rental of the restaurant to Jakub Odstrčil. I love to create nice places to live, I want my tenants to feel good here. I don't like fluctuations, the gap in rent payment also always brings with it the necessary renovations.
The house has a variable layout, you can easily break through the partitions, for example, enlarge one for a larger family, etc. I am glad that my daughter and her husband will live in the apartment of the original owner, Mr. Bláha. Mr. Bláha built the house on a secluded plot, I think he was a visionary and thought ahead of his time.
Mr. Bláha bought the plot in 1907, and began construction in 1914, at the beginning of the First World War. Later he sold the house to my uncle because the house did not pay off. There used to be a dance floor in front of the restaurant and there was a famous spa nearby. The Na Mlejnku Spa disappeared with the construction of the Barrandovský Bridge, and the Yellow and Blue Spas merged. The house then served as a cruise restaurant for spa guests. During communism, nationalization took place and the restaurant served as a kindergarten in the 1970s. Then our family got the house back in restitutions. We have resumed the operation of the restaurant and in addition, there is also a "Ice Cream Parlor Braník" on the side of the building. The menu offer includes 18 types of handmade ice cream and always 4 special offers of the day.
The cooperation, both with Jakub Odstrčil and with other colleagues with whom I negotiated, was pleasant. Finding a new tenant for a restaurant was not easy just because of the covid.
I think the guests need time, you know, some long for the previous restaurant, but again new guests are coming back. Half of the guests were Greeks at the opening ceremony, then I first noticed the Greek community in Prague. The owner of the Greek restaurant, Mr. Radosław Adam Kleczaj, has a real human character, walks among the guests and asks how they like the meal, which he prepared. In the previous restaurant the guests did not even know who was cooking them.
The restaurant definitely serves excellent Greek food, everything is based on authentic Cretan cuisine, in the summer you will certainly enjoy homemade ice cream or you can come and play an escape game, which I have been running in the cellar since 2016.
Opening hours
Monday - Friday
8:30 AM - 5:30 PM
