Harbor East

Developers of the historic Bagby Furniture Building in Little Italy, on the edge of Harbor East, have boosted the building's occupancy to 80 percent since launching a $5 million renovation of what had been mostly vacant office space. Chesapeake Real Estate Group LLC has brought in 15 new office and retail tenants since buying the building in 2007, when it was 20 percent filled, converting the first-floor offices into street-level shops, adding a lobby and courtyard for outdoor dining and renovating the four levels of offices.

Food *** (3 stars) Service *** (3 stars) Atmosphere ** (2 stars) There are two kinds of people who shouldn't even consider eating at the new RA Sushi in Harbor East: Those who take their sushi seriously, and those who don't like really loud, throbbing rock 'n' roll music while they eat. In fact, if you fall into either of those two categories, don't even read any farther. That's how enraged this Arizona-based chain will make you. Poor:]

One sunny day two summers ago, as Yvonne Hardy-Phillips and her husband, Oliver, shopped for groceries at Whole Foods Market in Harbor East, something happened that took the couple and other store patrons by surprise. From out of the gourmet cheese aisle strolled "two leggy, svelte 20-something women, clad only in bikinis and barely there cover-ups," recalls Hardy-Phillips, an arts educator who lives in Mount Vernon. Catching snatches of their conversation, the pair had just stepped off one of the pleasure boats moored in nearby waters, a block or so away, she says.

When considering where to watch a Ravens playoff game, Harbor East doesn't come immediately to mind - or really at all. It's a place for fancy dinners and shopping sprees, not for cheap beer and bar food. Townhouse Kitchen and Bar is an exception, even if the industrial-chic bar doesn't look it. With its modern artwork, open space and touch-screen taps at select tables, it's a bar that certainly feels as if it belongs in Harbor East. But on Saturday, it will likely be a sea of purple, and many of those fans will be enjoying reasonably priced food and drinks, thanks to Townhouse's surprisingly good gameday offers.

When I asked Blake Smith, who has a degree in finance, why he decided to open a pizzeria, he sounded incredulous: "You have to love pizza. C'mon." His new brick-oven pizza place is the Bagby Pizza Co. (1006 Fleet St., 410-605-0444, BagbyPizza.com), just open this week in Harbor East. It's in the old Bagby Furniture building, which is where it gets its name. His chef, if you can call a pizza maker a chef without sounding a little high-falutin', is Kyle Gillies. The menu features gourmet pizza, sandwiches, salads and pasta.

Baltimore's top officials agreed yesterday to give financial breaks and payment deferrals worth several million dollars to baking magnate and businessman John Paterakis, after being told they were needed so that the first phase of the Inner Harbor East development near Little Italy can go forward.The Board of Estimates voted unanimously to provide two Paterakis development companies with $1.85 million in financial breaks, allowing them to forgo $850,000 in contributions to public improvements and $750,000 in payments for operating a marina.

The $130 million Four Seasons hotel and residence project, billed as an "urban resort," at Harbor East received preliminary approval from the city's design panel yesterday, opening the way for construction to start. Plans are to break ground by the end of summer and to open as early as 2006. Members of Baltimore's Design Advisory Panel praised the work done by Hill Glazier Architects of Palo Alto, Calif., in simplifying the design of the project, which is to feature 200 hotel rooms, 26 to 28 condominiums, spa facilities and retail space.

The roster has some of the biggest names in high-end autos: Ferrari, Lamborghini, Alfa Romeo. On Sunday, dozens of shiny Italian cars worth hundreds of thousands of dollars each will roll into Harbor East for the Viva Italia Concours D'Elegance. Now in its fifth year, the car show raises money and awareness for the Children's Guild, an organization that helps children with emotional disabilities. Patrons can get up close and personal with more than 70 of the most powerful cars and motorcycles ever made and enter a raffle to win a Toyota Yaris.

Now I really feel old. A friend of mine used to call the grocery store at the Rotunda the "Flirt Giant. " And it was true, back when I moved here about 25 years ago: You got the sense people were trolling the aisles there for more than Lean Cuisines. It was bad enough that over the years the Flirt Giant aged out — if there were still shoppers on the prowl there, they also were probably on walkers. The Rotunda itself was sagging a bit, slowly some of its smaller shops, but as long as the Giant anchored one end and the movie theater the other, the mall seemed to still have a heartbeat.

The Four Seasons Hotel Baltimore is about to welcome its first guests, but visitors taking a sneak peek might not realize the hotel isn't open yet. The lobby is bustling with excitement and energy. There's a crew of attractive people sitting at the bar with the harbor as a backdrop. The smell of savory pit-roasted chicken fills the restaurant area. And the spa already has a quiet ambience — and a few clients. They are mostly employees, explains Judith Dumrauf, the hotel's director of marketing.