{Fabrizio Schenardi}
Fabrizio Schenardi, executive chef at Four Seasons Hotel St. Louis is leaving the luxury hotel for the Four Seasons Resort Orlando at Walt Disney World Resort. Slated to open in the summer of 2014, the new Florida property will be the largest Four Seasons resort in the Americas, with five restaurants, 40,000 square feet of catering space and 444 guest rooms, according to Stephen Wancha, Four Seasons St. Louis’ director of food and beverage. Wancha also will be leaving St. Louis to helm the food and beverage program at the new Orlando property.
Schenardi arrived in St. Louis in the summer of 2010, after moving here from Tampa, Fla., where he worked at the Renaissance Tampa Hotel International Plaza. “He has a house down there,” Wancha said. “The only place he would have left here for is this [new] hotel.” During the three and a half years Schenardi has worked at the Four Seasons and its fine dining restaurant, Cielo, he has become a recognizable face among the local culinary community, participating regularly in events with other local chefs and even hosting prominent events, such as James Beard Celebrity Chef Tour and Heritage BBQ by Cochon at the downtown property. Schenardi will depart for Tampa in March 2014.
Wancha’s final day is Jan. 3, 2014. His replacement, Jeff Hanson, hails from Vancouver, British Columbia, where he worked as GM of the Four Seasons’ seafood restaurant YEW.
Wancha said the hotel is currently searching for Schenardi’s replacement. “We’d like to keep [Cielo] an Italian concept,” he said. In addition, he noted that the ideal candidate is someone who is excited to engage with the local culinary community. “That has to happen. That’s the key … There’s no mandate that we take a Four Seasons person.”
This article appears in December 2013.