Yorkville’s Blackstone Bar & Grille to reopen in February as the Silver Fox

A lot of people have asked Yonas Hagos why he wanted to buy a restaurant in the middle of a pandemic.

People thought he was “crazy,” Hagos said in an interview.

But Hagos, 38, from Yorkville, bought Blackstone Bar & Grill at 600 E. Veterans Parkway (Route 34) anyway. He plans to rebrand it as the Silver Fox and is aiming for a Valentine’s Day grand opening with reservations only.

In fact, Hagos might be the one unique success story in the local restaurant scene able to pull the thing off. The Sudanese-born Army veteran already is a leading Midwest restaurant franchise owner. He owns “probably close to 30″ franchises by his own count, including the Arby’s, Dunkin’ Donuts and Smoothie King in Yorkville.

“The best time to invest in the stock market is when everything’s down,” Hagos said of his pivot to fine dining amid the pandemic. “If I wasn’t in a good financial situation, yeah, I wouldn’t recommend this to someone who just woke up one morning like ‘I’m going to go open a restaurant.’”

Hagos isn’t going into the venture alone. Brandon Partridge, the manager of Yorkville eatery Roadhouse Country Bar & Grill, along with Joe Perretta, a local chef, will partner with Hagos on the Silver Fox.

“I’ve got the experience. I’ve got the right partners,” Hagos remarked. “We’ve got the right staff. So if done right, you can do well in this business.”

Hagos’ life story is quite different than your average Yorkville resident.

Born to parents from Ethiopia, Hagos spent most of his young life in a refugee camp in Sudan. Then his family emigrated to the Chicago suburbs when he was 10. He enlisted in the U.S. Army after 9/11, and received a Purple Heart after being wounded by a rocket-propelled grenade in Iraq.

After leaving the armed forces, Hagos relocated to Plano before the Great Recession, then purchased a home in Yorkville in 2016.

“I saw an opportunity to get a new home for a fraction of the price in a growing area and came out here,” Hagos said. “I like this area. It’s a good town.”

Flash forward to 2021. The Yorkville businessman is taking on a new challenge: rebranding and renovating Blackstone, a long-time and well-loved local favorite, into the Silver Fox.

“It’s been a dream of mine,” Hagos said of owning a restaurant. “Franchising is cool. You’re not reinventing the wheel. Someone has already done it for you and you can become successful. But I kind of wanted more of a challenge, something different.”

Hagos acquired Blackstone in early December and started renovations earlier this month. The new eatery will feature a patio on the other side of the garage doors. The previous wooden interior will get traded for silver accents, silver table tops, a clear glass wine cellar and a remodeled bar area.

With a menu filled with hummus trios, tomahawk steaks, a “slushy lounge” and a high-end liquor selection, Hagos described his vision for the establishment as “fine dining, casual upscale.”

“Not intimidating, not a place where you’re going to walk in and say ‘I can’t afford this,’” Hagos said. “If you’ve been to Chicago, if you’ve been to the upscale restaurants, that’s what we’re bringing here.”

While the Silver Fox’s patio will not be ready by Valentine’s Day, Hagos is locked into unveiling the restaurant by the mid-February holiday, despite facing a pandemic that has no end in sight.

“I think it’s the appropriate time to get in,” Hagos said. “I’ve got stores throughout the country and I decided to invest in the city I live in. I saw an opportunity.”