A Mexican Restaurant Is Opening in the Former Lark on the Park Space

In November 2018, restaurateur Shannon Wynne (Meddlesome Moth, Rodeo Goat, Mudhen Meats & Greens) announced that he would be closing the Arts District restaurant Lark on the Park to make way for a new, more affordable concept. Four months later, we know what that concept will be: Miriam Cocina Latina, a namesake restaurant that "celebrates Miriam Jimenez, a restaurant veteran well-known for her tenure with Mr. Mesero and Mesero restaurants during the tenure of Mico Rodriguez," according to a press release.

“I walked into a fashionable Mexican restaurant several years ago and was struck by the charisma and charm of the big grin on the authoritative woman greeting folks as they entered,” Wynne said in the release. “I returned weekly because of this woman. When her bosses moved her to a new Addison location, I perceived a drop in my enthusiasm for my weekly visit. When it came time to re-conceive our Lark concept, I told my partners I was fresh out of new ideas, except for one. I wanted to track down that woman with the giant grin and build a concept with her.”

The restaurant is scheduled to open in May, and judging by photos Wynne has posted on social media, they're gutting Lark's space for the build-out. When Wynne shuttered Lark, he cited the need for a more casual, affordable restaurant in the space across the street from Klyde Warren Park.

"We think now, with the maturing of the downtown residential population, that we need to afford a more comfortable and approachable product that better serves the neighborhood, for those that both work and live there," he said at the time.

At this new restaurant, "Miriam is in charge," Wynne says. "We need another Mexican restaurant in Dallas like we need another hole in the head. But what we don’t have enough of is that feeling I had when I walked into that fashionable Mexican restaurant years ago. Recognition, love and appreciation from the second I entered. We hope to change this soon.”

Miriam Cocina Latina will open at 2015 Woodall Rodgers Freeway.