The dining room facing Boston Common at 9 Park Street Place has gone dark twice in less than two years, and both times the operator pointed to funding. Barbara Lynch closed No. 9 Park in 2024 and said the restaurant needed an investment her shareholders could not make. Nine closed in June 2026, less than a month after a three-star Boston Globe review, saying the funding it needed "did not materialize." On Wednesday, October 14, a New York Italian group called Fumo goes before Boston's Licensing Board to take over the space. Its filing includes more than a new name over the door.
Two operators, one petition
Here is the address's recent history in order:
- 1998 to the end of 2024: No. 9 Park. Barbara Lynch's flagship had a 26-year run. Boston.com's October 2024 report quoted her explanation: "The harsh realities of the global pandemic and the many difficulties faced calls for significant investment, which neither myself nor my fellow shareholders are positioned to do."
- August 15, 2025: Nine opens. Restaurateur Allan Rodriguez opened it with much of the former No. 9 Park team, according to Boston Magazine.
- May 2026: three stars. Globe critic Devra First reviewed the reworked Nine and gave it three stars.
- June 2026: Nine closes. The restaurant announced on Instagram that "no additional funding will be available."
- October 8, 2026: Fumo's petition appears. The city published the Licensing Board notice for a transfer to a company doing business as FUMO Beacon Hill.
- October 14, 2026, 10 a.m.: the hearing. The Licensing Board will hear the transfer virtually.
If you have read the Boston Restaurant Talk post that broke the Fumo news, it gives No. 9 Park's run as 1998 to 2004. That is a typo. Boston.com, the Globe and Boston Magazine all date the closing to the end of 2024.
Nine fixed the menu and still ran short
Nine's ten months matter here because the restaurant did most things a new operator in a famous space is supposed to do.
It opened with continuity. Andrew Simonich, a longtime Lynch chef, built a tasting menu on classic French technique, and the room's French-Italian roots carried over into a six-course format. Boston Magazine reported the drinks side as a gin-focused "gin palace" program, unusual for Boston and a clear reason to visit.
Then it changed course. According to the Globe's report on the closing, Nine went through several personnel and menu changes after opening and brought in chef Kevin Girshman, who had worked at Michelin-starred restaurants in Chicago. Girshman rewrote the menu so each dish pointed to a place in the world. First's review called out a Thessaloniki-influenced scallop appetizer and a chicken roulade with Cajun stuffing, sweet potato and coffee gnocchi, and wrote that the menu "now told a more personal story."
That review ran in May. Less than a month later, Nine posted its farewell, which the Globe quoted: "Following an incredible review from The Boston Globe and the overwhelmingly positive feedback from our guests, we truly felt we had found our stride. Unfortunately, the financial support needed to sustain and grow the business during this critical period did not materialize."
Read next to Lynch's statement from 2024, the pattern is plain. Both closings came from the same place: the restaurant needed outside capital to keep going, and the capital didn't come. Critics and guests had already approved of the food in both cases. Anyone who walks past the dark windows on Park Street and wonders what the next tenant will cook is asking the second most important question about this space.
What Fumo's filing says
The city's notice for Wednesday's hearing is short, and nearly every line in it matters for anyone following this address.
- Current license holder: Nine Restaurant Group, LLC, d/b/a 9, at 9 Park St, holding a Common Victualler 7-Day All-Alcoholic Beverages License, number LB-99417.
- Proposed new holder: 9 Park St Restaurant Group LLC, d/b/a FUMO Beacon Hill, at the same location.
- Manager: Luigi Fanini. Boston Restaurant Talk identifies him as managing partner of Fumo UES, the group's Upper East Side restaurant.
- Closing hour: 1:00 a.m.
- A second request: the petition also asks to pledge the license to 9 PSR, LLC.
Two of these lines connect directly to the room's history.
Fumo's company is asking to take over Nine's existing all-alcoholic beverages license. Nine's whole identity was built on a bar program, and the license is the asset that carries over from one operator to the next. The 1 a.m. closing hour suggests a room expected to serve late into the evening, not only a seated dinner service.
The pledge request names 9 PSR, LLC as a separate party with an interest in the license, sitting next to the operating company. The notice doesn't explain the arrangement, and neither does the reporting so far. Still, an address whose last two operators named missing funding as the reason they closed now has a petition with a financing-related entity written into the paperwork from the start.
Who Fumo is
Fumo started in 2016 with a restaurant in the Hamilton Heights section of Manhattan. A Harlem neighborhood blog previewed it in March of that year as a new Italian spot on Amsterdam Avenue, due to open that weekend. Ten years later, Fumo's website links menus for eight locations: Harlem, Upper West Side, Upper East Side, Kips Bay, The Inn, Chelsea, Caffe e Vino and Soho. Boston Restaurant Talk describes the group as known in part for its pizza and pasta.
This is a different kind of operator from the room's last two. No. 9 Park was a chef's flagship, the restaurant that won Lynch's group national attention, including the James Beard Foundation's Outstanding Wine Program award in 2012. Nine was a single ambitious restaurant whose owner's other projects were in a different style altogether. The Globe noted that Rodriguez's portfolio includes the Mexican restaurants El Centro, La Neta and Sabina Mezcaleria.
Fumo would be the first group at this address that already runs the same concept in several places. An operator with eight sets of menus has systems, suppliers and a track record that can be pointed to when raising money. Both previous closings turned on finding that money. Fumo's style is also more casual than the room has known. Pizza and pasta near the State House is a different evening from a six-course tasting menu with a gin list. For neighbors, it is likely a more frequent one.
What stays unknown after Wednesday
As of today, October 12, the hearing hasn't happened. Neither the city notice nor Boston Restaurant Talk gives an opening date, and no decision on the transfer has been reported. A few things will still be open after Wednesday even if the transfer goes through:
| Question | What the record shows as of October 12, 2026 |
|---|---|
| Will the Licensing Board approve the transfer? | Hearing set for October 14, 2026, 10 a.m., virtual |
| When will FUMO Beacon Hill open? | No date in the notice or in the reporting |
| What will the menu look like at this address? | No Boston menu published; the group is known in part for pizza and pasta |
| What role does 9 PSR, LLC play? | Named in the petition as the party the license would be pledged to; no further detail public |
| Will any of the No. 9 Park or Nine team stay on? | Not addressed in the notice or the reporting |
The Licensing Board posts its hearing notices on Boston.gov. The Fumo transfer is item 29 on the October 14 agenda, listed under Nine Restaurant Group, LLC.
If the board approves the transfer on Wednesday, whether the room facing the Common succeeds next time depends less on how good the cooking is and more on whether the new operator has enough money behind it to get through its first year. We'll be following Wednesday's hearing and the Park Street storefronts around it. If you want to talk about what the changes on your block mean for a home you own or are thinking about, Urban Circle Realty is glad to talk through what we're seeing in Beacon Hill. Connect with Sherean & the Urban Circle team.
