THE TRELLIS RESTAURANT CLOSES AFTER 40 YEARS IN WILLIAMSBURG

On Tuesday, the most famous restaurant on the Peninsula quietly closed its doors.

After 40 years, The Trellis is now a memory.

By next month, says The Trellis’ owner and executive chef David Everett, the space at 403 W. Duke of Gloucester St. will be transformed into a new Northern Italian restaurant called La Piazza, with handmade pastas and light Mediterranean fare.

“The Trellis has, in a sense, run its course,” said Everett. “Not a lot of restaurants have been around that long. 40 years is a pretty big mark … It’s bittersweet, but it’s not what it used to be. And it wasn’t what it used to be when we took over.”

Everett bought the Trellis in 2009 from its original chef and owner, Marcel Desaulniers, who founded the restaurant in 1980. It was in the ‘90s, however, that The Trellis became a juggernaut — with acclaim from both local and national media.

In that decade, the James Beard Foundation named Desaulniers

not just the best chef in the Mid-Atlantic, but the best pastry chef in America. His cookbooks were likewise named the best of their kind in the country — twice. And on the TV show Death by Chocolate, Desaulniers — along with his impeccable mustache — taught home chefs the sweet, sweet way of cakes and pies.

But by the time Everett took over in 2009, he said, Desaulniers was ready to move on.

“We tried to stay true to the original focus,” Everett said.

That meant keeping not only the staff, but many of the recipes, especially the restaurant's iconic Death by Chocolate dessert. The dessert famously takes three days to make — a chocolate ice-cream-topped chocolate torte, glazed with dark chocolate over layers of chocolate meringue, ganache, cake and mousse.

The dessert was so popular, says Everett, that for more than a decade, since even before he bought the restaurant, making that dessert took up almost the entire job of one pastry chef.

But the restaurant scene has changed around it, Everett said, and The Trellis doesn't make as much sense as it used to.

For one thing, he says, it's too big, at 250 seats.

“When the Trellis opened, it was the only player in town,” Everett says. “A large restaurant like that made some sense.”

But there are more restaurants in Williamsburg — including Everett's.

Everett's restaurant holdings include the

British-inflected gastropub fare at DoG Street Pub, upscale bistro food at Blue Talon, fresh-baked treats at Blackbird Bakery and quirky small plates at Culture Cafe.

For the new restaurant, La Piazza, Everett plans to cut the dining room's size by nearly half. He'll also renovate the space drastically to a “quintessentially Italian” vibe he associates with the Tuscan and Venetian cuisine he wants to present.

“We don't want people coming in and thinking, ‘Oh, it's just the Trellis with Italian food.'”

The menu isn't set, but Everett plans to make pasta the star of the menu, with handmade tagliatelle and fettucini, and possibly a bucatini dish — with fresh tomato and light cream sauces, and some of the octopus and squid dishes for which Northern Italy is known. He also says he plans to keep prices low.

Everett says that when he broke the news, reaction from the staff and public has been surprisingly upbeat.

“It was a breath of fresh air, “he says. “We were dreading the moment, but it turned out very positive.”

Nonetheless, he remains very conscious that in opening a new and more modern Italian restaurant, he'll also be closing the book on a 40-year tradition in Williamsburg.

“A lot of people had a lot of memories here. There were a lot of engagements, I get that. But that doesn't pay the bills,” he says. “I think it's time for something new.”