The Rosebud Diner in Davis Square has been dark since mid-May, and Somerville officials just made clear it isn't reopening anytime soon. What operator Babu Koganti initially described as a quick floor repair has stretched into a monthslong shutdown tangled up in real estate negotiations and a municipal licensing rebuke, leaving the fate of the 1941 landmark uncertain.
According to the Somerville Times, Koganti in July estimated the situation would be resolved within two to three weeks, but Rosebud Bar and Kitchen remains closed for an indeterminate amount of time. Koganti has said he plans to reopen the restaurant in the near future, though no firm date has been given. The diner sits at 381 Summer Street in Davis Square, a location that has anchored the neighborhood for more than eight decades.
The closure's early framing has since come under scrutiny. As reported by the Cambridge | Somerville Independent, a spokesperson initially claimed in May that a minor plumbing issue would be fixed within a day, yet the venue remained dark for more than two months before floor repairs and landlord purchase talks were disclosed publicly. Koganti has said the closure was done to have some of the floor re-done, and reporting from May indicated Rosebud was also updating its menu, installing a new HVAC system, and replacing its floors during the same stretch.
A Landlord Deal Still in Limbo
At the center of the delay is a property negotiation between Koganti's Bindaas Concepts and the building's owner. Koganti is negotiating to purchase the building from his landlord, and he is currently in legal negotiations over the deal, the Independent reports. The property has been owned since 2013 by 318 Jumbo LLC, an entity managed by restaurateur Martin A. Bloom, who previously founded the Vinny Testa's restaurant chain and transformed the site from a classic diner into a full-service restaurant after buying it.
If Koganti does not ultimately buy the building, the outlet notes, the landlord may simply find a new tenant instead. That scenario would carry its own complications: any incoming operator would have to independently reapply for a liquor license rather than simply take over the existing one, since Somerville licenses are not automatically transferable between operators.
City Rolls Back Hours to Zero
The prolonged, unannounced shutdown has drawn formal pushback from Somerville regulators. At a July hearing, Licensing Commission Chairman Joe Lynch admonished Koganti for the extended closure, telling him licensees cannot simply close at will, per the Independent's account of the meeting. The commission subsequently voted to roll Rosebud's operational hours back to zero while the property negotiations continue, a move confirmed in the seed reporting from the Somerville Times.
This isn't the first time Koganti's ownership of Rosebud has generated friction. His company, Bindaas Concepts, acquired the restaurant from Alpine Restaurant Group for $800,000 in June 2023, then laid off all 55 staff members with minimal notice that October before introducing Indian-fusion dishes to the menu, according to the Independent. The 2023 takeover sparked local backlash from workers who lost their jobs in the transition. Beyond Rosebud, Koganti is also involved with Godavari, Madras Dosa Co., and Don't Tell Aunty, part of a regional restaurant network that spans Harvard Square, Boston's Seaport, and Chestnut Hill.
A Diner With Deep Somerville Roots
The stakes of Rosebud's uncertain future are heightened by its status as a genuine historic landmark. Built in 1941 by the Worcester Lunch Car Company as Car #773, the diner was added to the National Register of Historic Places on September 22, 1999, as a rare surviving example of a semi-streamliner dining car in Massachusetts, per the National Park Service. The structure still consists of its original 400-square-foot dining car attached to a larger rear dining room built on later.
The diner's name traces back to its opening year, reportedly borrowed from the sled at the center of Orson Welles' 1941 film Citizen Kane, according to Route 1 Views. The Nichols family ran the Rosebud for 55 years starting in 1958, with one interruption between 1989 and 1994 when the space operated as a Tex-Mex restaurant called Cuckoo's Nest before foreclosure returned it to the Nichols family. Evangelos Nichols eventually sold the property in 2013, ending more than five decades of family ownership, and Bloom's subsequent renovation gutted the original 1941 interior for modern table seating while local preservation rules kept the exterior shell intact.
Part of a Bigger Shift in Davis Square
Rosebud's extended closure lands amid broader upheaval in Davis Square's commercial landscape. As Hoodline previously reported, the historic Somerville Theatre property block was listed for sale in July, following the permanent closure of the 23-year-old Italian seafood restaurant Out of the Blue back in February 2024. Together, those shifts point to a neighborhood commercial scene in flux, with longstanding tenants and landlords alike facing turnover pressure that now includes one of the square's most recognizable diners.
