Shona Cunningham's New Year's Eve was tearful.
After people finished their meals at Max Mercier's Le Parisien restaurant, she walked them to the door, hugged them and asked them if the food was good — even though it now doesn't matter. The restaurant is closed.
Le Parisien, a 30-year-old Salt Lake landmark, shut its doors Sunday night.
For a long time, it was the only five-star restaurant in the city. It was Salt Lake's first French restaurant. The first to offer escargot. On its walls hang framed, hand-written compliments from the likes of Jackie Kennedy and Richard Nixon.
But the building the restaurant leased was sold to a bank, said Cunningham, co-owner with Marshall Fujita.
"With that, construction, changes and progress, we don't have too many choices," Cunningham said.
Unlike many of the franchise restaurants that have entered the Salt Lake area, Le Parisien, at the corner of 300 East and 400 South, was considered home to many "regulars," who had come to eat there monthly, weekly and even daily.
The restaurant had also managed to keep its waitresses for years.
"It's very sad," said Flo Blank, a waitress there for 17 years. "I know their (regular customers') lives. I remember when they were little kids and now they're grown up. They still come here."
The service, salad dressing, escargots de Bourgogne, quiche Lorraine and chateaubriand bearnaise are the reasons customers said they kept coming back.
Brothers Joel and James LaSalle had eaten at Le Parisien for 22 years. They used to eat there with their parents and said they were sad the restaurant closed. "There's nothing better," Joel LaSalle said.
When Brad Henderson lived in Wyoming, he said he drove to Salt Lake City at least once a month to eat at the restaurant.
"It's had a colorful past," said diner Elizabeth Lindsey, who ate there with her mother for years.
Max Mercier, from the Bordeaux region of France, opened the restaurant on June 11, 1970. He owned it through 1993. Mercier, now 64 years old, started the restaurant after owning an informal dining bistro on State Street.
He named the restaurant Le Parisien but also put his name on the sign, hoping his good name would entice the customers from the bistro who knew him and his food.
"He didn't have money to advertise and buy a sign," Cunningham said.
On the sign was also written "French-Italian Restaurant," even though Mercier didn't know much about Italian cuisine.
"The reason for French-Italian is because it was assumed a French restaurant would be expensive," Cunningham said.
Cunningham said she doesn't know what she'll do next. Nor does Blank. Both said they're going to go away for a while and think about their futures.
E-MAIL: lhancock@desnews.com