UPDATED: Aug. 29, 3:48 p.m.

Cosmos Pizza & Grill, a Marshall Street institution endeared by Syracuse University students, faculty and staff for more than 50 years, has closed and will soon turn into a Thai and Vietnamese restaurant.

Sweet Basil Thai & Vietnamese Cuisine is planning on opening in mid-September, said Stan Tran, the restaurant’s head chef and the owner’s son-in-law. The restaurant’s menu will be half Thai and half Vietnamese food, and will be open seven days a week — likely from 11 a.m.-11 p.m. to start, he said. Eventually, Tran said, the plan is to offer delivery.

The restaurant is being relocated from Mattydale, which is about 10 minutes north of SU, where it was strictly a Thai place.

“We don’t want to spread ourself too thin,” said Tran, a 2003 SU alumnus. “We want to concentrate on one restaurant.”

Founded in 1963 by George Cannellos and Demo Stathis, Cosmos, at 143 Marshall St. next to Insomnia Cookies and Verizon Wireless, was known for its breakfast food and as a hangout spot for generations of SU students.

The pizza shop’s future has been uncertain since mid-May, when a sign appeared in the window saying the restaurant was closed for “maintenance and improvements.” In July, a for sale sign was put up. Cannellos died Jan. 11, 2013, and Stathis on July 27.

Tran said he did not know why Cosmos had closed. Loyal customers from the Mattydale restaurant would call whenever a location closer to them opened, Tran said. About 10 had called when Friendly’s went out of business in Fayetteville, and someone alerted them to the open space on Marshall Street.

A four-page special zoning permit application for Sweet Basil Thai & Vietnamese Cuisine was filed July 28 with the Syracuse Planning Commission and approved Aug. 18.

The owners of the property are listed as Marshall Redfield LLC, the Jackson Family Trust and Cynthia G. Jackson, according to Onondaga County property tax records. Marshall Redfield LLC lists Hugh Gregg II — a Syracuse lawyer whose name and phone number were on the for sale sign  — as its contact, according to New York State Department of State.

Gregg did not return three messages left at his Jamesville home and was not in the office.

Right now, Tran said, the interior of the restaurant is almost finished. The county health department is inspecting it next week.

“As soon as they give us a green light, we can open,” he said.

Though he said there are other Asian cuisine restaurants in the area, Tran said he hopes that Sweet Basil Thai & Vietnamese Cuisine will be there for the next 50 years— as long as Cosmos held its spot on the Hill.

Published on August 29, 2014 at 10:39 am

Contact Dylan: dmsegelb@syr.edu | @dylan_segelbaum