Updated: Evening Star Cafe to Close for Renovations

3 p.m. update — Megan Bailey, the Neighborhood Restaurant Group's director of public relations, confirms that Evening Star Cafe has suspended lunch service until the renovation is completed.

Bailey also confirmed that earlier this year NRG purchased the building as well as the building that formerly housed Barkley Square.

"Yes, we do own both of those buildings now, but currently have no plans involving them," Bailey wrote in an email.

after news of the potential sale broke.

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will close for renovations on Nov. 6 and will reopen later that month, according to The Washington Post.

Tom Sietsema wrote Tuesday evening in the Post’s Going Out Gurus blog that Neighborhood Restaurant Group co-owner Michael Babin has hired the restaurant’s initial designer, Rick Singleton, to lead the overhaul.

Babin told the Post that the building, located at 2000 Mt. Vernon Avenue, was never meant to be a restaurant. NRG earlier this year and recently put on a new roof. Babin told the Post he hopes to install a 2,000-square-foot garden up there.

Evening Star Cafe has been without a chef since close of business Saturday, which marked Will Artley’s final shift.

Artley, who had been with the restaurant for six years, isn’t jumping to another restaurant right away, according to the Post.

In August, Artley participated in an event at James Beard House in New York with other Washington-area chefs. He is expected to appear on an upcoming episode of “Chopped” on the Food Network.

Artley and Evening Star Cafe at June’s Taste of Del Ray for a beet salad.

How much of a loss do you think Artley is to Evening Star? Tell us in the comments.