Nearly ten years after opening the doors at En Boca and watching them shut again in under a year, restaurateur Skip Sack has finally closed the book on his long-running fight with Harvard University. Sack and his company, Classic Restaurant Concepts, have accepted a roughly $1.1 million settlement tied to the now-defunct Harvard Square restaurant and the construction chaos he says helped kill it.
The deal, which Sack says he signed on May 28, ends a lawsuit that started after En Boca opened in 2016 and shut down about nine months later. At the heart of the dispute was Harvard’s renovation of the nearby Smith Campus Center and a long Holyoke Street closure that Sack argues strangled foot traffic to the Mediterranean small-plates spot.
According to The Boston Globe, the settlement totaled about $1.1 million, and Harvard declined to comment on the terms. Sack told the paper he also turned down the university’s request that he sign a non-disparagement clause.
Classic Restaurant Concepts first sued Harvard in 2017, alleging the university downplayed how extensive the Smith Campus Center overhaul would be and failed to warn that Holyoke Street would be closed for an extended stretch. A legal analysis in Banker & Tradesman noted that the case largely turned on whether that street shutdown crossed the line into a breach of lease covenants or a constructive eviction. The Smith Campus Center itself reopened in 2018 after a multi-year renovation, coverage in the Harvard Gazette recounts.
Sack told The Boston Globe that Classic poured more than $2.6 million into En Boca’s build-out and then lost roughly $700,000 during its brief run. After subtracting the settlement, he estimated the company’s collective losses at about $4.3 million. “The motto at Harvard is ‘Veritas,’” Sack said in that interview. “They were anything but truthful.”
En Boca had opened in the former Sandrine’s space in Harvard Square as a Mediterranean small-plates concept, an arrival first reported by Eater Boston.
Appeal, Remand, And A Last-Minute Deal
The case did not follow a straight line. A Superior Court judge initially sided with Harvard and even entered judgment on the university’s counterclaim. But in 2024, the state Appeals Court vacated key portions of that ruling and sent several claims back for further review, according to Banker & Tradesman.
Confronted with a narrowed case and a trial looming this spring, Sack said he chose to settle rather than keep battling in court.
Local Fallout: Pubs And Pandemic Strain
Sack has said the En Boca losses left Classic Restaurant Concepts too weakened to withstand the shock of the pandemic on the hospitality industry. Ultimately, both The Kinsale in downtown Boston and The Asgard in Cambridge closed. Local restaurant trackers noted the twin shutdowns in 2021 and reported that the company cited the pandemic and a collapse in office traffic as major factors, according to Boston Restaurant Talk.
Why The Case Still Matters
By settling, both sides avoided a full-blown trial and a definitive appellate ruling on the legal issues at stake. That means Massachusetts courts did not issue the kind of clear, widely cited decision that might spell out how far landlords must go in warning commercial tenants about big, disruptive institutional projects next door.
As a result, the questions the Appeals Court flagged remain live ones for lawyers: how the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing applies in this context, what counts as interference with a tenant’s right to quiet enjoyment, and how potential Chapter 93A unfair business practice claims fit in. Attorneys expect those issues to resurface whenever large construction projects collide with small businesses on tight margins.
Sack has said the payout brings some relief after a decade of litigation but not full closure on what he sees as an expensive cautionary tale in one of the country’s most closely watched college towns.
