Sexy Steak brings a halal Italian steakhouse into the GAR Building

The Grand Army of the Republic Building has gone years without a steady tenant. The Richardsonian Romanesque castle at Grand River and Cass, built around 1900 by architect Julius Hess as a clubhouse for Civil War veterans, runs about 30,000 square feet across five floors. As of February 26, 2024, it is open again, this time as Sexy Steak, an Italian steakhouse from Prime Concepts Detroit, along with a set of event halls upstairs.

Sexy Steak occupies the lower floors. The kitchen is run by executive chef Martin Attisha, and the menu leans on traditional Italian recipes around USDA prime steaks, house pasta, veal, and seafood, with cuts pulled from a dry-aging chamber and a Himalayan salt display in the room. The detail that sets it apart in this market is on its own About page in plain terms: all protein at Sexy Steak is halal.

The restaurant is one of several concepts under Prime Concepts Detroit, the hospitality group whose roster also includes Prime29, Aurora Italiana, NARA, and PAO. The group is tied to developer Joe Barbat's Barbat Holdings, which bought the GAR Building in early 2023. "Sexy Steak is definitely our most dynamic concept to date," Barbat said in the company's announcement of the opening.

The restoration is the part with the longer history behind it. According to Prime Concepts Detroit, the work kept the original windows, staircase details, and entrance tile flooring, restored the wood floors, exposed the brick, and added custom wall coverings from Detroit Wallpaper. The interiors were handled by Royal Oak's Art Harrison Interiors, and GAR Building historian Bruce Butgereit advised on the building's history.

Above the restaurant, the upper floors became Castle Hall, a multi-room event venue. The third floor holds the Cass Hall and Adams Lounge spaces, and the fourth floor opens into a Grand Ballroom with a mezzanine and downtown views. A halal-only Italian steakhouse inside a Civil War veterans' building is the kind of pairing that tends to happen only in Detroit.

Sexy Steak is at 1942 Grand River Ave., Detroit.