Hall on Franklin to close in Tampa Heights
By Ashley Gurbal Kritzer
Tampa Bay Business Journal
Published: Nov 4, 2020

The Hall on Franklin plans to close its restaurant collective in a historic Tampa Heights storefront as it builds out a new location in Midtown Tampa.

The Hall, a food hall with full-service, sit-down dining, signed a lease earlier this year for a location at Midtown Tampa, a mixed-use development under construction at the intersection of Interstate 275 and North Dale Mabry Highway.

The move comes after the owner of the Tampa Heights building, A2 LLC, filed an eviction lawsuit against the Hall in May. In response, Wilson's Vigor Group accused A2 of negotiating in bad faith in a June legal filing.

The Tampa Heights location will close Dec. 15, owner Jamal Wilson told the Tampa Bay Business Journal on Wednesday. The Midtown Tampa location is slated to open in the first quarter of 2021.

"We have made the decision to close the original Hall location on Franklin Street and move forward to open a Hall in Midtown and our new site in St. Petersburg," Wilson said. "As great as the original Franklin Street site was, there are certain things we were not able to do there, such as outside dining, adding a private dining room and other amenities that are especially important amid Covid-19."

When The Hall opened in Tampa Heights in 2017, it was Tampa's first food hall. Wilson has since signed leases for locations in Orlando and Atlanta.