Lazy Bear Partners Open JouJou March 6 at 65 Division Street

David Barzelay and Colleen Booth, the partners behind two-Michelin-starred Lazy Bear, opened JouJou in the Design District, converting the former Grove at 65 Division Street into a 6,000-square-foot, à la carte French brasserie built around theatrical seafood towers and a street-facing pastry window. The space, reworked in part by enclosing a former porch, is positioned to bring back old-fashioned French brasserie glamour while seating a large service footprint in the heart of the new Design District cluster.

The restaurant debuted the weekend of March 6, 2026, with the opening publicized as Friday, March 6. Reservations are taking via Tock, and initial service hours are set for Wednesdays and Thursdays from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m., Fridays and Saturdays from 4 p.m. to 11 p.m., and Sundays from 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. JouJou plans to add Tuesdays starting March 17, when it will open Tuesdays from 4 p.m. to 10 p.m.

JouJou bills itself as a "big-tent French" house with a seafood-forward focus rather than a rigid tasting menu. Signature service elements include a three-tier seafood platter marketed as The JouJou Plateaux, "mountains of caviar," pristine French omelets, and a visible pastry window that gives passersby a view into the kitchen. The menu blends brasserie classics—vichyssoise, trout almondine, escargots, steak au poivre, French onion soup, and steak frites—with twists such as black cod a l’ananas, a seafood take on duck a l'orange, and classic desserts like tarte tatin and baba au rhum, including flambeed preparations.

The location places JouJou at the intersection of SoMa and the Design District, joining newly opened or elevated venues such as Niku Steakhouse and Omakase. The partners have said the project aims to match the scale and pomp of bygone San Francisco institutions, naming influences that include New York’s Le Veau D'Or and the late La Folie. The team explicitly hopes the venue will rival the former Stars and La Folie as a destination for classic French dining in the city.

From a market perspective, JouJou’s timing and format fit a broader pattern of design-led, high-profile hospitality launches in March 2026 intended to recapture foot traffic and attract tourists: the Big Four has a planned reopening on March 17, and the Huntington Hotel began a broader reopening March 1, with other hotel and cocktail-salon milestones following. Immediate business indicators to monitor will be reservation patterns on Tock, early guest feedback, and whether a large, seafood-centric menu generates the higher average checks needed to sustain a 6,000-square-foot fine-dining operation.

This is the first restaurant Barzelay has opened dedicated to French food, a project he framed personally: "a cuisine that is very close to me and that I love." If JouJou can translate that culinary focus into consistent covers and strong check averages, the partners’ gamble on accessible luxury could reshape dining flows in the Design District and signal a return of grand French brasseries to San Francisco’s upscale dining map.