Still Recovering After Easter Fire, Gables Aims to Open For Memorial Day

Even though a forced owner Sandra Beninati to temporarily close the Gables Restaurant and Inn in Beach Haven, Beninati said she aims to open her historic restaurant in time to start the summer season during the Memorial Day weekend.

Much work remains in order to make this happen, but the construction crews from a local company — most of the workers the same pepole who helped renovate the place just a few years ago — are working tirelessly at the site to make this goal a reality, with the support of the local community also making a tremendous difference, Beninati said.

Since it was first built in 1892, Gables Inn and Restaurant in Beach Haven had seen many changes, renovations and expansions. Owned by the Cahill family in the 19th century, then purchased by history and preservation enthusiast Lucy Reddington in the 1970s, the Gables changed its identity from an informal community gathering spot to Long Beach Island's first bed and breakfast.

When Reddington sold it to a couple, Adolfo DeMartini and Rita Rapella, the inn expanded into a restaurant as well, receiving acclaim for its cuisine.

The place came across Beninati's field of vision in 2005.

"We were just seduced by the charm and the neglect, everything that happened when you impractically fall in love with an older building," said Beninati, speaking of herself and her husband Stephen Beninati, who is a financial planner.

Sondra Beninati, a New Yorker with a residence in Beach Haven as well, and a massage therapist who felt she had been at the end of an important stage in her life, was eager for a new challenge.

"I think I was just over the 50-year mark," Beninati said. "Massage therapy tends to be a Cinderella profession. It ends at midnight. Although I didn’t have to work, my husband could provide for me, I’m not the type of person who cannot work, and this felt like a massive project, the kind I like."

Soon after acquiring the Gables, Beninati embarked on vigorous renovations.

"The foundation of the house was completely gone — it was lifting and sagging," Beninati said. "So the house had to be lifted eight feet in the air, all the joist underneath had to be replaced."

The renovations, which cost "millions," Beninati said, included rebuilding a new foundation, completely redoing the first and second floors, adding more rooms, including an office, a bathroom and a bedroom, and renovating the kitchen. The Beninatis also added a little apartment in the back of the house, which they used as their own home.

And then came a new challenge this Easter.

"Easter was an absolutely gorgeous day. We had just opened the season and we had almost double the booking that we did from last Easter," Beninati said, with about 150 reservations made for the evening. "We had just had the place painted, and we had just re-done the floors, we were all spiffed up and ready to go."

The beautiful Sunday afternoon was drawing to a close on April 8, as about 80 guests enjoyed their meal on the glassed in veranda, happy to catch up with one another, and with the restaurant's staff.

"One of my best friends came to see me, we were laughing about something (out in the garden), and I looked, and I saw a plume of very black smoke," Beninati said. "I walked toward it sort of unbelieving, and then I saw the flames by the side of the building, and I turned to my friend and I said, 'Fire.' "

In the kitchen, and in the dining room people were having "a lovely time," Beninati said, and many didn't believe her when she first rushed in to get everyone out, until they saw the flames for themselves from the outside.

"People left their tables and basically congregated across the street, and then we waited," Beninati said. "And that was the hardest part, those moments before the firemen came, with all the equipment and stuff like that. You wring your hands and wait helpless as your home burns."

According to the Fire Marshall's office, the fire's cause was ruled as accidental. Also, fire officials said, the dry, warm and windy weather conditions made it all too easy for the flames to spread.

"We think it started in the garbage or in the brush, this is what the fire marshall told us," Beninati said. "They believed that it was started by a cigarette butt."

Onlookers gathered across the street to take pictures and watch as firefighters from Beach Haven, Surf City, Ship Bottom, Barnegat, Stafford, High Point, Eagleswood, Mystic Islands, Tuckerton and Parkertown , with assistance from Beach Haven, Long Beach Township and Ship Bottom police.

Later the Gables patrons learned that the fire did not affect the dining room, the kitchen or any of the historic parts of the Gables building. It did damage Beninati's apartment and office.

"If it had to happen, I guess that’s the best case scenario," Beninati said. "What is disheartening is the water damage. A lot of water went into the house. We've been stripping drywall. Basically I am back in the mode that I  was in six years ago when we restored the house. It's not unfamiliar."

The building company that helped renovate the Gables seven years ago, Tallent Construction Inc. of Beach Haven, is now working on re-building the site, said Beninati. In addition to stripping the drywall, the work includes building refrigeration fans and exhaust fans for the kitchen, drying out the building and replacing the roof on the damaged part, working six days a week with a large crew.

"Most of the workers are Beach Haven residents," Beninati said. "They
lived with this property in the town growing up, and they also restored it, and now they are here again. They are a great crew."

Though not positive, Beninati is hopeful about being able to open the Gables by Memorial Day.

The goal is ambitious, Beninati acknowledged, but, the community's support made taking on such challenges possible, she said.

"The most humbling thing has been the emails that I've gotten and the support that I've gotten from the local businesses," Beninati said. "One of the first emails I got was (from the owner of) Stefano’s Restaurant and it said, 'How can I help? I'm here. Use my kitchen. What else can I do?' "

From Beach Haven neighbors across the streets to patrons from New York, Philadelphia and all over New Jersey, Beninati was overwhelmed with calls and offers to help.

"It felt like this whole spirit of a barn raising," she added. "Like, we're not gonna let you fail."