Forget about the river walk in San Antonio. Flower Mound has its own river walk now, with five new Dallas-area restaurants and bars.
The project has been a 14-year slog that stalled after the first developer defaulted. It was then picked up by Mehrdad Moayedi, who has worked on projects in 45 cities, including Dallas, Celina, Little Elm and Westlake. Moayedi is behind the renovation of the Statler Hilton hotel in downtown Dallas and the re-creation of the Collin Creek Mall site in Plano, among others.
Moayedi bought 158 acres in Flower Mound in 2013, and his company, Centurion American, spent $400 million on construction to turn it into a riverfront oasis, with restaurants and bars and a wedding reception hall. The development will also have two hotels.
“When you’re out here on nights and weekends, it’s busy — and for a while, there weren’t even any restaurants open,” says Robert Hall, CEO of Refined Hospitality Concepts, the company that hand-picked each of the five eateries in the development.
“It’s already becoming a place to hang out.”
Sfereco, an Italian restaurant, was the first to open at the River Walk at Central Park, on Nov. 8, 2021. Primo’s MX Kitchen, a place for margaritas and fajitas, was next, open on Dec. 6, 2021. Then comes Scout, a 6,000-square-foot bar with pingpong and foosball, expected to debut in late 2021 or early 2022.
Next year, Hall’s restaurant row will be complete when Boi Na Braza and Parliament open.
Boi Na Braza was a 20-year-old Brazilian steakhouse in Grapevine that closed in early 2021. It was started by Julio Matheus, and his son John Matheus is expected to run the new restaurant in a partnership with Refined Hospitality Concepts.
Parliament is a cocktail bar in Uptown started by Dallas bartender Eddie “Lucky” Campbell.
The Flower Mound development has become a who’s who of Dallas restaurant operators and bartenders, and many of them opened other concepts around North Texas before joining up with Hall. Moayedi’s Centurion American owns Hall’s company, Refined Hospitality Concepts, making it a supergroup that has enticed people like chef Ryan Carbery, who previously worked at Nosh Euro Bistro and the short-lived yet excellent snout-to-tail restaurant in Dallas, Red Fork Tavern. New to the group are the Matheuses and Campbell. The company has also partnered with Richard Rawlings, the TV star and car guy who is opening a 40,000-square-foot restaurant in Farmers Branch.
“This is Dallas restaurants supporting one another,” Hall said.
The river walk was a “long journey,” said interim town manager Tommy Dalton because it was plagued by the recession, a bankruptcy and the challenge of building on a floodplain.
Some 14 years later, Dalton says the nearly finished project will create “new energy and excitement” in Flower Mound.
Sfereco, the first restaurant to open, is at 4120 River Walk Drive, Flower Mound. The second, Primo’s MX Kitchen & Lounge, opened Dec. 6, 2021 at the same address.
Original story written Nov. 9, 2021. Story updated Dec. 6, 2021 with news of Primo’s opening.
