Cafe Sevilla has formally vacated its Downtown Long Beach space on Pine Avenue, handing the lease over to Jerry Najera, who will rename it Ole. He is the new owner of the long-running Continental Room in Fullerton after Sean Francis handed over the reins. The space is reopening on Mar. 29.
Ole will be an updated, more modernized version of Sevilla
Najera spoke highly of not just Downtown—”I understand Eric had a problem with the homelessness but, in all honesty, I feel like Downtown keeps getting better and better,” he said—but also of Cafe Sevilla itself. Its staff. Its ambiance. And its vibe.
“We’ve kept the entire staff of Sevilla because they were so good that there was really no need to let anyone go,” Najera said. “We’re keeping the club, we’re keeping the flamenco entertainment… It’s really about sprucing up and modernizing the space more than anything.”
The club, soon to be dubbed “Club O,” will be the heart of the business. Najera loves the restaurant but admits that “without the club, the restaurant wouldn’t survive. If we break even on the restaurant, I am good.”
Come Mar. 29, Ole will open its doors for the first time, revamped and ready for a new era of Spanish-inspired entertainment.
The history of Cafe Sevilla
The concept of Sevilla began in 1987, when Spanish-born founders Rogelio and Janet Huidobro opened the first Sevilla with the goal of recreating the atmosphere of the tapas bars and nightlife they knew from Spain.
Its flagship home in Cafe Sevilla helped anchor the brand in the Gaslamp Quarter, where Sevilla developed a reputation for offering a full-night experience: dinner service built around paellas and tapas, flamenco performances, salsa dancing, and nightclub energy that often stretched late into the night.
That formula later expanded north to Cafe Sevilla on Pine Avenue in downtown Long Beach, where it became one of the corridor’s longest-standing destination restaurants—especially during the early years of Pine’s entertainment revival, when the district was defining itself as a nightlife center. For many Long Beach residents, Sevilla became synonymous with birthdays, pre-concert dinners, date nights and late evenings that blurred dinner into dancing.
More recently, the company expanded into Cafe Sevilla at The Triangle in Costa Mesa, bringing the same Spanish formula—tapas, flamenco, cocktails and live music—to Orange County with a larger patio-driven footprint.
Ole is located at 140 Pine Ave.
