After 18 years, famous restaurant in Kneza Mihaila Street to be unlocked – Grcka kraljica to open to guests (PHOTO)

The Grcka kraljica restaurant at 51 Kneza Mihaila Street, which last welcomed guests back in the now already distant 2007, when it was “temporarily” closed, is finally opening its doors after 18 years. For months, passers-by could notice that work was underway in one of the oldest buildings in the capital’s main pedestrian street - both inside and on the facade, but there were no precise announcements about what the 19th-century building would feature, or who would manage it.

When more serious works on Grcka kraljica began, eKapija sent an inquiry to the City of Belgrade regarding this, but apart from a brief answer about the building itself, there were no other details about the lease and rental, until recently, on an Instagram page called Grcka kraljica, information appeared that the famous restaurant with a recognizable name would return to the hospitality map of the capital on July 10, or today.

There is no official information about who rented this space and renovated it, returning it to its hospitality purpose, but according to unofficial information, it is the company Reina Amalia, which was mentioned as the tenant of this city business space in 2017, when it seemed that the renovation of this space was finally starting.

According to data available on the eCadaster, the building in Kneza Mihaila Street is registered as a residential and commercial building with a business area of 436 square meters and apartments ranging in size from 13 to 60 square meters. The data indicates that the property of the business premises is state-owned, and the user is the municipality of Stari Grad, while Milorad Vasic is listed as the owner of the residential part.

On the other hand, ahead of the opening, there is no official information about whether the relevant institutions dealing with the protection of cultural monuments have issued approval for the adaptation and reconstruction project and carried out supervision, which is not unimportant, given that the building belongs to a spatial, cultural and historical entity of exceptional importance - Kneza Mihaila Street.

What is known and what can be seen in the images of the renovated building published ahead of the opening is that it will be a modern restaurant that refers to the history of the building itself, but also the history of the city whose fate it has shared for almost two centuries.

How it all began and where it got stuck and stopped 18 years ago

It is not known for certain who designed the building on the corner of Kneza Mihaila and Rajiceva streets, but it is known that it has been preserved in the form in which it was created. It was here that Despot Stefanovic opened the tavern “Despotov han” on his estate in the 1830s. In the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, the upper floor was used as a lodging for travelers and merchants, but was later converted into private apartments. For a long time, the basement of Grcka kraljica was also used as a restaurant, where the Zvezda discotheque (later Metro) operated.

But the owners of the building changed frequently. After Despot Stefanovic, this building was owned by the famous Belgrade family Kumanudi, and after World War II the building became public property.

It first took on its current name, Grcka kraljica (Greek Queen), in the second half of the 19th century. It remained so until the mid-20th century, when, during Tito’s Yugoslavia, the name was changed to Plavi Jadran (Blue Adriatic). The old name was restored in 1990, when the renovated restaurant was officially opened by the then mayor of Belgrade, Aleksandar Bakocevic.

Due to renovations, this famous tavern was “temporarily” closed in 2007 by the Tri grozda company, which had operated it since the 1960s.

The renovations were quickly halted, as the Republic Construction Inspection ordered Tri grozda to obtain the permits necessary to continue work on this building in 2008. However, this did not happen, and in the meantime, in 2012, bankruptcy proceedings were opened against Tri grozda. This company was not the owner of the building at 51 Kneza Mihaila Street, but a tenant, so Grcka kraljica did not suffer the same fate. The hospitality establishment, on the other hand, was not much better off, because while other taverns, restaurants and cafes around it on Kneza Mihaila Street were full of guests, Grcka kraljica was still temporarily locked up.



It seemed that better days were coming for it in the spring of 2017, when certain works began on Grcka kraljica, indicating that it would reopen after a decade of being closed, but in the autumn of that year a notice appeared on its door stating that the tenant of the building, the company Reina Amalia, had been given a warning for outstanding debts. The Secretariat for Property and Legal Affairs, which took over the management of commercial space in 10 central city municipalities in 2016, told Politika in the fall of 2017 that the contract with the company was signed in November 2014, that is to say, at a time when this commercial space was managed by the Stari Grad municipality (from 1993 to December 2016, the municipality rented out floor area on its territory). According to unofficial information from that period, in the first two years, the Stari Grad municipality did not invoice Reina Amalia for rent, because the agreement was that the tenant would renovate the dilapidated building, and that the rent would start being collected when the facility began operating. But then, towards the end of 2016, Grcka kraljica, as a commercial space, came under the jurisdiction of the city. As it was reported at the time, the tenant was also held back from starting the reconstruction during that period by a dispute with one of its neighbors. When it comes to the purpose, the city emphasized eight years ago that it would remain a hospitality facility.

Reina Amalia at the address of Grcka kraljica

As can be seen in the publicly available data on the portal of the Business Registers Agency, the company Reina Amalia doo Stari grad was founded on July 28, 2014, and is located at the same address as Grcka kraljica – 51 Kneza Mihaila Street. The company’s main activity is non-specialized wholesale trade. The legal representative, or director, is Radule Selic, and the owner is the company Dva jelena, owned by Tomas Rutovic.

Silent witness to turbulent history of capital city

The restaurant building at 51 Kneza Mihaila Street, which, unlike other significant buildings in Belgrade, has survived several wars and bombings, is certainly a silent witness to many historical moments. Not far from it, in 1862, after the murder of a Serbian boy at Cukur cesma, rebel Serbs erected barricades in front of the Turkish fortress at Kalemegdan. Likewise, in its immediate vicinity, the handover of the keys of the city to Prince Mihailo Obrenovic was celebrated, and in addition, guests of Grcka kraljica witnessed the laying of wooden cobblestones in Kneza Mihaila Street in the first decade of the 20th century.

Dejan Aleksic

Reina Amalia d.o.o. Beograd

Sekretarijat za imovinske i pravne poslove

Reina Amalia Belgrade

Dva jelena Belgrade

Grčka kraljica Belgrade

Tri grozda Belgrade

Republic Construction Inspection

Secretariat for Property and Legal Affairs

Tomaš Rutović

Milorad Vasić

Despot Stefanović

Aleksandar Bakočević

Radule Selić

Despotov han

Kumanudi family

Kneza Mihaila Street