From AL.com: Margaritaville restaurant coming to Gulf Shores
A major new project offering “the ultimate in luxury boating experience” in Gulf Shores will bring a Margaritaville restaurant to the city whose beaches inspired Margaritaville founder Jimmy Buffett.
The news was revealed at a recent “topping out” ceremony celebrating a milestone in construction that saw the complex’s highest steel framing put into place. Peter Bos, CEO and founder of Legendary Marina and Yacht Club, shared the news.
Renderings show a spacious three-story structure surrounded by sand, with a small pool between it and the water. Features include balconies, at least one outdoor bar and semiprivate cabana-type booths facing the sand and water. It also offers direct access to boats moored at a nearby pier.
The restaurant will fit into an overall project that cover 27 acres along the Intracoastal Waterway, about a mile west of Ala. 59. Major features include two enclosed storage buildings with racks that can handle boats up to 50 feet long; a marina basin with dockage for vessels up to 60 feet long; a clubhouse and pool; an open park with amphitheater; mixed-use commercial space; hotel and condo units; and townhomes and multi-unit village homes.
Bos described it as a future “town center of Gulf Shores including a festive marketplace and entertainment center anchored with a wet and dry marine complex.”
Rodney Chamberlain, Legendary’s VP of Marina Development, said Phase One of the project will come online in stages starting early next year. “The first phase that you see now will be open in February of ‘24,” he said. “That’ll be marina storage and services. Then we have marine sales, that’ll probably be open in July of ‘24. And then the Margaritaville looks like fall of ‘25.”
The overall development, called Town Center at Waterway Village, will continue adding features after that.
“One cool thing, you can get to the Gulf of Mexico either way, east or west,” he said. Boaters headed east have to contend with extensive no-wake zones, he said, but those opting to go east can quickly hit Mobile Bay and then the Gulf.
Chamberlain said the same company has a marina in Destin, where it also owns the Harborwalk development that includes a Margaritaville. That helped give developers confidence that Margaritaville was the right restaurant for this location.
“One thing I’ll say that we all agreed upon is that when you say the word ‘Margaritaville,’ no matter who you are it kind of conjures up this image of no shoes, beach sand, kicking back. That’s exactly the kind of experience we want to project,” he said. “We thought it was just very crucial to get the right restaurant in first. We’re a marina, launching boats and servicing boats, watching boats coming in and out, I think a Margaritaville compliments that sort of environment.”
The Legendary Marina in Destin is flanked by a LuLu’s, the restaurant founded by Jimmy Buffett’s sister Lucy Buffett. Patrons of that venue seem to enjoy watching the marina traffic, he said.
Renderings appear to show two major restaurant facilities on the development’s waterfront.
The Margaritaville Restaurant won’t be the first on the central Gulf Coast, as there are locations in Biloxi, Panama City Beach and Destin, Fla. Others are scattered far and wide, in locations as diverse as Tulsa, Okla.; Times Square in New York City; Nashville and Pigeon Forge, Tenn.; Jamaica; Niagara Falls; and Las Vegas. The format varies somewhat from place to place. Some are freestanding restaurants, as in Destin, while some are within larger resorts, as in Biloxi.
Margaritaville restaurants include an array of menu items inspired by Buffett’s song titles and stories. Examples include Jimmy’s Jammin’ Jambalaya, Volcano Nachos, a couple of varieties of Cheeseburger in Paradise and Landshark Lager Fish & Chips.
Look forward to it. JB lives on💙🙏