LOVE Park 'spaceship' will get a restaurant

The Fairmount Park Welcome Center on JFK Plaza - the so-called "spaceship" at the corner of 16th Street and JFK Boulevard - will become a restaurant.

The Fairmount Park Conservancy plans a one-year renovation of JFK Plaza, aka LOVE Park, starting next spring. The renovated welcome center, whose architecture work will be overseen by KieranTimberlake, will accommodate a restaurant seating 50 to 55 people indoors and 100 to 150 people outdoors on a balcony and plaza and will have a light-based art installation on its ceiling.

The Conservancy is scouting for an operator, and has been circulating in the restaurant community a document known as a "request for expressions of interest," a precursor to a request for proposal. Basically, restaurateurs who think they're qualified can throw their hat into the ring.

Put down your fork. The restaurant won't open till spring 2017 at the earliest, said Kathryn Ott Lovell, the Conservancy's executive director. She said the restaurant would be expected to be open for lunch and dinner.

(Conjecturing here that the interested names might include Circles and Ground Round, opposed to Corner Bakery and Square Burger.)

The Conservancy will brief prospective restaurateurs and answer questions at 1 p.m. Sept. 2 at the Municipal Services Building, 16th floor. Interested parties have until Sept. 21 to submit their REIs.

Robert Indiana's LOVE statue and the fountain will remain in the park, of course. Under plans by landscape architects Hargreaves Associates, green space will be added and the underground garage will be extensively repaired.

The food trucks will be moved from 16th and JFK, in front of the spaceship, to a new spot on the park's opposite corner, at 15th and Arch Streets.