This hidden gem on the KC restaurant scene may be closing. ‘It’s just time to move on’
In 2011, Whit Ross and his sister, Cindy Foster, dumped their life savings into a big bet.
They bought an old, crumbling building in a long-neglected Independence neighborhood, spent two years renovating it, and eventually opened an unusual, multi-component concept: a fine-dining restaurant with an art gallery, gift shop and events space.
They called it Vivilore — named after a book they found while antiquing, but also because they liked the ring of a word that combined viva (life) and lore (story).
“There used to be a lot of places in the area that were little knickknack shops that also served food — where customers could come through, pick up a candle, have lunch,” Ross, 64, said on a recent morning, seated on the Vivilore patio.
“Nell Hill’s in Atchison, Crybaby Farm in Liberty,” added Foster, 63. “Webster House. Some shops in Weston. Every hometown square had a shop like that, and they’re just not around anymore. We wanted to have something like that again.”
As it turned out, so did a lot of customers around Kansas City. Vivilore’s geographic obscurity — it is located in the Englewood Arts District, a four-block stretch of Independence that many Kansas Citians do not even know exists — ended up being a strength. It is something of a secret: a ladies-who-lunch destination with a parking lot full of luxury cars with Johnson County plates.
Just hearing about it? You’re almost too late. Ross and Foster want to retire — him to the Lake of the Ozarks, her to Colorado. Vivilore is on the market.
“Ask anybody that’s been in food service: 12 years is a long time in a restaurant,” Ross said. “It’s just Cindy and I. We’ve never had a manager. We do front of house, back of house, retail, gardening, decorating, buying. It’s just time to move on.”
An Independence jewel
As Independence natives who both attended Van Horn High School, just down the street from Vivilore, Ross and Foster had grown up admiring the brick building at 10815 E. Winner Road. It was for decades home to Sermon-Anderson, an interior design firm owned by T. Sermon and Mitch Anderson.
“The Sermons were a really well-connected family,” Foster said. “Sermon’s dad (Roger) had been the mayor of Independence for more than 20 years during the Truman and Pendergast era. Truman would come over and drink bourbon and play cards with them.”
She added: “(Sermon and Anderson) traveled all around the world buying high-end antiques. They’d have a $1,500 leopard-print reading chair in here but also paper flowers like the kind you can get now at Hobby Lobby. But back then, you got that stuff in places like this. We would stop in and buy something small and look at all the antiques.”
After Sermon and Anderson died, in the 1990s, the building sat vacant and fell into disrepair. A few buyers tried to revamp it but little came of it until 2010, when Ross and Foster saw a for-sale sign outside the building and agreed to partner on a concept.
Ross had worked in food service for 30 years by then, as a caterer and inside health care operations. Foster started her career as a corporate pilot, flying out of the downtown airport for clients like Waddell and Reed and Cecil Van Tuyl. Then she got into interior demolition, scrapping projects like Bannister Mall and the Payless Shoes distribution center in Topeka.
The pair, who naturally exude a kind of Midwestern elegance, saw in the building an opportunity to combine their enthusiasms: food, interior design, antiques and art. Plus, Ross had a little following in Johnson County from his catering work.
After two years of work on the property, Vivilore debuted in 2012.
Up for sale
What they ended up with was — still is — difficult to categorize.
The restaurant, located on the first floor of the 6,000-square-foot, ivy-covered brick building, has seating for about 70 in three small, art-splashed dining rooms (everything on the walls is for sale). It is constantly being redecorated but typically maintains an aesthetic of Victorian maximalism.
“We go in this old-school direction because that’s what I know,” Ross said. “But somebody could come in, get rid of all this, paint everything white, and make it so much more contemporary. Anybody can see the potential of this being a hipper, younger type of place. Even empty, it’s a really unique building.”
The food is modern American.
“The chicken salad sandwich for lunch is the most popular,” Foster said. “People want to buy that stuff by the quart, but it’s so simple. We also do a classic club sandwich that’s the same as you get at the Ritz in Paris. Everything’s made fresh every day.”
The two floors above the restaurant are a cluttered retail maze of antiques, home decor, gifts and more art.
“Women come in, have a glass of chardonnay or cabernet, and wander around upstairs,” Ross said. “It’s so fun to see them wander back down with a handful of stuff. It makes it so if we have a bad retail day, maybe we have a good restaurant day, or the other way around. Then, some days, both things fall into place and you think, ‘We’re gonna make payroll this week.’”
Out back is a verdant, brick-lined courtyard with seating for another 70 diners. It’s also where you’ll find Ross’ house, a 1,000-square-foot hideaway on the property that he periodically disappears into throughout the day when he’s not in the kitchen or gardening.
“It doesn’t have to be a house,” Ross said. “That’s just what I chose for it. It could be used for 100 different things when I vacate.”
Swan Dive, a separate events space in a freestanding building just east of Vivilore, adds another 2,000 square feet to the property.
It’s all for sale: the buildings, the garden, the restaurant, and the inventory — every chair and piece of art inside. The restaurant staff plans to stay. Asking price: $1.5 million.
“We’ll even teach you how to buy art, if you want,” Ross said.
It was getting close to 11 a.m.: time to open. Women freshly arrived in their Audis and Mercedes were lined up outside, eager for chicken salad sandwiches in the garden. Ross headed for the kitchen. Foster disappeared into Vivilore to turn on three floors’ worth of lights.
“It’s not that we don’t love this place,” Foster said. “It’s just time for someone new to take over. There’s a lot going on here. We’re in a zoned arts district. Some young people with new ideas could really make something of this. Or even old people with new ideas.”
