New Bar Opens in Old Home of Crimson Sports Grille

Red Line, Harvard Square’s newest bar and restaurant, opened quietly this past weekend, without the spotlights or discounts one might expect from the bar replacing the Crimson Sports Grille.

The bar’s co-owner, Patrick M. Lee, said the first few days of business have been “encouraging.”

Despite slow dinner and lunch crowds, Lee said the Red Line had busy Friday and Saturday nights, with lines extending out the door.

While the opening means more competition for neighboring pubs, most local bars have laid out the welcome mat for the former owners of Grafton Street.

“We think [Red Line] will help us,” said Amy J. Barry, day bartender at Shay’s, located across JFK Street from Red Line. “Not too many people come down to this end of the Square. It’ll bring people down.”

Lee said he agreed. He said he expects that his venue will help his competitors attract more consumers to share, as Red Line’s expected clientele matches that of others bars in the Square.

Nevertheless, as Friday’s general manager Deborah Dellorto said, sharing customers may come back to hurt the neighbors.

“We lost $800 in sales the night they opened,” she said. “It definitely took away from my business.”

Daedalus owner Lawrence P. Hopkins said he suffered no lost revenue.

“[Red Line’s opening] has had no affect on our business,” he said. “We have a long-standing relationship with the owners. They’re good for the area.”

Red Line was created by the owners of Temple Bar in Cambridge and the new Grafton Street, scheduled to open later this year at the intersection of Bow Street and Mass. Ave.

Red Line is named for its subterranean companion—the subway train that stops in Harvard Square.

“We’ve got the red light over the bar—people who live and work in Cambridge identify with the Red Line as the way they get here,” Lee said. “Plus, we’re underground, something you don’t see every day.”

But Red Line’s distinctly upscale ambiance couldn’t be farther from the T’s sometimes sordid motif.

With hardwood floors, a slate bar and distinctive red light shades, the restaurant’s menu offers New York steak and seared duck for dinner, and sandwiches and salads on its more reasonably priced lunch menu.

And so far, Lee said they have not experienced any of the problems with underage drinking that plagued the Grille.

“Everything’s been smooth,” Lee said.

Instead of calling the ID checkers at the front door “bouncers,” Lee refers to his relatively undersized front line as “doormen.”

“Bigger guys can cause more problems than they solve,” Lee said. “Our guys are people who know IDs and are good with people. People are going to realize that they have to toe the line here.”

Red Line features a large drink selection, and the bar includes an inverted glass cleaner that washes glasses with a fountain of spray.

The bar also boasts a Harvard institution in their bartender, who goes by Paul “Boston’s Best Bartender” Barry. Barry worked at the old Grafton Street and teaches bartending courses for Harvard Student Agencies in his Irish accent.

The consensus among patrons of Red Line appears to be “so far, so good,” according to Harvard University Dining Services production manager Paul Deal, who said he used to grab a drink at the Grille after work but was trying the new bar out yesterday.

Syracuse University senior Brad W. Bestgen, from Stoughton, Mass., said he noticed a different atmosphere from the Grille.

“It used to be a bunch of college kids running around getting hammered,” he said. “This is a little different.”

The transition from the old Grille to the new Red Line became complete Sunday morning at about 3 a.m., when three young men attempted to take down the old Grille sign still fastened to the new Red Line facade.

As the three men tried unsuccessfully to unscrew the bolted sign, the Red Line staff sat, watched, and chuckled, before scaring the vandals away.

—Staff writer Justin D. Gest can be reached at gest@fas.harvard.edu.