Beaches soars into Portland airport

A new Beaches Restaurant & Bar has opened for business at Portland International Airport, offering a taste of the tropics before travelers head for the skies.

The decor of the 6,200-square-foot eatery in the terminal’s Oregon Market area was designed to remind travelers that “your vacation starts now,” said Mark Matthias, owner of the new venue and its older sibling, Beaches Restaurant & Bar on Vancouver’s Columbia River waterfront south of state Highway 14.

The new restaurant boasts the warm-weather ambiance of the tropics played out in humorous wall murals that depict animals engaged in human activity.

“There’s a lobster suntanning on the beach and a pelican at the barbecue,” Matthias said.

The murals, seven in all, were designed and painted by Jason Prouty, an Oregon City artist. Prouty’s caricatures include elements that link the PDX Beaches Restaurant to the original Vancouver venue. The murals also represent regional landmarks and the causes that Matthias supports. For example, a sign for the beach shack bar reads “The Buoys and Gulls Club,” to symbolize Beaches’ support of the local Boys and Girls Club. Another mural features local scenes painted on the backs of idle surfboards on a beach.

“We tied in the elements of who we are and what we do in the community,” said Matthias, who has operated the Vancouver Beaches since 1995.

Palm trees, bamboo, painted surfboards and a 1957 Corvette convertible round out the decor at the new restaurant, which offers a daily menu of breakfasts, lunches, dinners and happy hours, with views of jet airplanes rolling across the tarmac.

$1 million remodel

Matthias invested more than $1 million to remodel the restaurant space, which seats 152 patrons, and includes a counter for takeout orders. The new restaurant employs a staff of 50 workers.

The location, which can be accessed without passing through security, is in space once occupied by the Rose City Cafe & Wine Bar and a Pendleton Woolen Mills store.

Matthias, 54, announced plans last year to open the restaurant. The project was launched when he took over the Rose City venue and rehired many of its employees. In February, renovation crews were brought in to remodel the site.

The work was carried out by Vancouver-based RSV Building Solutions.

Matthias said the new venue carries a slightly different lineup of menu offerings aimed at satisfying on-the-go customers.

“Probably about half of our business is takeout, and about half of the people eat in the restaurant,” he said.

Matthias said Beaches uses sturdy packaging to help the to-go orders keep while patrons move through the airport’s security check and toward the gates.

“Our tag line in the takeout area is, ‘Our food flies well,’” he said.