Chef Brendan McGill has quietly pulled out of downtown Seattle, closing his last two restaurants in the city this week and retreating to his Bainbridge Island base. Café Hitchcock and the Oyster Cellar have now gone dark in the historic Exchange Building, erasing two of First Avenue’s most visible independent lunch-and-dinner options and ending McGill’s longest-running downtown run.
The closures were first reported June 2, 2026, by the Puget Sound Business Journal, which noted that McGill shut down the Exchange Building spots on May 31 and June 1. According to the Business Journal, he is now concentrating on three restaurants on Bainbridge Island and plans to focus his efforts there while he re-evaluates his downtown leases.
From fine dining experiments to everyday cafes
McGill has been reshaping his restaurant group for several years, trimming higher-end experiments and leaning into more casual, all-day cafes. As The Seattle Times reported, McGill said “people just wanted it to be casual,” a shift that helps explain both the earlier Seabird closure and his recent strategy of consolidation.
Downtown’s Exchange Building and the Oyster Cellar
The Oyster Cellar was a 2024 retooling of the Exchange Building’s ground floor, a compact oyster bar McGill opened after cycling through earlier downtown concepts, as detailed by Eater Seattle. Local listings such as Seattle Met place Café Hitchcock at 818 First Ave and the Oyster Cellar at 822 1st Ave in the Exchange Building’s retail line, and ordering platform Toast still lists 822 1st Avenue as the Oyster Cellar’s address on its downtown menu page.
What’s next for McGill and the block
McGill told The Seattle Times he has felt like “the last man standing for five years” in downtown Seattle and that the numbers on fine dining often no longer work in the current market. The Puget Sound Business Journal reports he still holds the downtown leases and may revisit that footprint if office traffic comes back, but for now the plan is to consolidate on Bainbridge Island while he rethinks how to use the urban spaces…