On Aug. 5, 2025, this smoky fire broke out in a second-floor apartment above the Red Chimney Restaurant in Cleveland’s Slavic Village neighborhood. The building is structurally but not economically salvageable, so it will be demolished before summer (Tony Brancatelli). CLICK IMAGES TO ENLARGE THEM.
Building is sound, economics aren’t
If the beloved Red Chimney Restaurant was a luxury establishment in a vibrant, thriving neighborhood, the economics might favor its rebuilding following an Aug. 5, 2025 fire that was confined to a second-floor apartment at the back of the building where the blaze began.
But the water used by firefighters to put out the flames and cool any hot spots wasn’t confined to the second floor. Instead, it poured down into and heavily damaged the 50-plus-year-old restaurant below — apparently beyond the point of recovery.
So while the century-old building at 6501 Fleet Ave. is still structurally sound, a minor fire plus the economics of a family-style restaurant in the Slavic Village neighborhood of Cleveland it served conspired to levy a death sentence for the Red Chimney, said Tony Brancatelli.
The former city councilman was hired by the Red Chimney’s owners, the Skantzos Brothers PLL, to guide it through the city’s demolition approval process. While the fire was ruled accidental, the city’s Building Department issued a building code violation notice one week after the blaze.
The violation was the fire damage itself, affecting a portion of the building’s roof, deck walls, flooring, molding and heating-ventilating-air conditioning unit, the notice read. The matter was referred to Cleveland Housing Court where a pre-trial hearing is scheduled for 9 a.m. April 1, the court docket shows.
In happier times one year before the fire, the Red Chimney Restaurant hosted a scene filmed for the latest Superman movie. DC Studios chose Red Chimney because it had that classic diner look at the lunch counter where most of the scene was shot (The Neighborhood News).
“A way to have the prosecution’s case dismissed is to abate the repairs or demolish the structure,” Brancatelli said. “In this case, the building is so far gone it is neither financially or reasonably abated to renovate the structure. So demolition is the most appropriate path.”
Cost of demolition is estimated at $70,000 according to a permit application submitted to the city yesterday by Brancatelli. He said the insurance company has already provided the demolition funds and it was placed in escrow with the city.
“Hopefully, the judge will dismiss the case and give time to get through the multiple layers of a demolition process — design review, environmental remediation, permitting, then demolition. I suspect that would take about 60 days.”
Activist Ed McDonald, who posts videos on YouTube as Taco Slayer Aerial about abandoned buildings and illegal dumping, filed a complaint with the city last month about the Red Chimney.
“Building has been sitting vacant since a fire in August 2025,” he wrote in the complaint. “The fire damage has left the building in a horrific condition and it needs to be inspected to see if it needs to be condemned. Thank you.”
Photos submitted to Cleveland Housing Court showing the current condition of the Red Chimney Restaurant suggests a structure that is not an imminent threat to the neighborhood’s safety (Tony Brancatelli).
Brancatelli said condemnation is unnecessary as the demolition application is already in process. Furthermore, he said the building is completely intact and is not hazardous to passersby, so it does not require an emergency demolition by the city.
The future of the site, set at the important intersection of Fleet and East 65th Street, is unknown. Brancatelli said it’s premature to discuss if the property will be sold. The site is pretty small, perhaps too small for a fast food chain with a drive-through. But the Skantos brothers also own two vacant parcels across Fleet.
The Red Chimney Restaurant was started in the early 1970s by Joe Kofol who had another restaurant at Brookpark and State roads called the Blue Chimney. He closed the Blue Chimney and opened the Red Chimney.
In the 1970s, when the labor-intensive steel mills nearby were running three shifts a day and employing tens of thousands of workers, the Red Chimney restaurant was open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. It dished out all-day breakfasts, soups and sandwiches, chicken paprikash, meatloaf and pierogis.
Back then, Fleet Avenue was bustling with ethnic shops, bakeries and restaurants in a neighborhood that had 40,000 people, although it was already dropping from its 1950 population peak of 70,000 when Cleveland had nearly 1 million people.
The fire reportedly started in a bedroom of a second-floor apartment at the back of the building. A blue tarp was placed over a burned hole in the roof (Tony Brancatelli).
In 1999, despite decades of industrial automation and reduced employment, brothers Lou and Pete Skantzos bought the restaurant and had been running it ever since. They kept it going even as the neighborhood declined into the early 2000s with its nationally prominent housing foreclosure crisis.
As Slavic Village’s population dropped to 20,000 and more shops and restaurants on Fleet closed, the Red Chimney was one of the few places left where someone could get a healthy, hearty, Eastern European-style sit-down meal served by a waitress, waiter or one of the Skantzos brothers themselves.
The restaurant’s last claim to fame was its diner countertop being used as a scene in DC Studios’ 2025 “Superman” movie. Ironically, the movie was released on July 11 — less than one month before the fire.
After the fire, the Skantzos brothers held a fundraiser for the restaurant’s 17 employees left without work and a paycheck. But when the brothers said they would reopen the restaurant in Parma rather than in Slavic Village, there was a bit of a neighborhood backlash.
“I don’t fault them,” he said. “They found a good restaurant space that was closing (Pappou’s Restaurant, 8320 Snow Rd.) and they have renovations underway. They should be open soon, maybe in May. Still, it’s sad. It’s the end of an era for a 100-year-old building in a 200-year-old neighborhood.”
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