Cuban-American businessman Felipe Valls, founder of the iconic Versailles restaurant in Miami, Florida, died this Saturday of natural causes, his family confirmed. The 89-year-old from Santiago left the island in December 1960, after the government of Fidel Castro confiscated the family businesses, including restaurants and a nightclub.
Valls was born on March 8, 1933 in Santiago de Cuba, where his family owned several businesses, including gas stations, a restaurant and the Lido Supper Club, as well as auto parts dealers, the newspaper published. miami herald. At the age of 14, he was sent to the United States to attend his high school studies at the prestigious Riverside Military Academy in Gainesville, Georgia. He returned in 1950.
At the age of 27, forced by the regime, he emigrated to Miami with his seven-month-pregnant wife and their two children. He started from scratch. He worked as a busboy in South Beach, but his business skills led him to get a job at a restaurant equipment company in downtown Miami.
Felipe Valls found in the importation of espresso coffee machines from Italy and Spain, a route to continue growing
Valls possessed an entrepreneurial spirit like few others, which led him to design kitchens for restaurants, install refrigeration equipment and delve into the purchase of electrical appliances to repair and resell them. With the capital obtained from his business, in 1963 he dedicated himself to the sale of used restaurant equipment.
In that walk he found in the importation of espresso coffee machines from Italy and Spain, a route to continue growing. Valls went further, convinced of the business potential, he is credited with the invention of the “little window”, highlights the newspaper miami heraldthis allowed “cafés to continue selling coffee and pastries to street customers before air conditioning became commonplace.”
The miami herald defined Valls as a “culinary, social and cultural landmark in the Miami neighborhood”. Which led him to found more than 20 restaurants and the La Carreta franchise, the same name as one of the establishments that the regime confiscated from him in Havana and led to bankruptcy after decades of deterioration. By a strange coincidence, its former owner dies at the precise moment of the closure and demolition of La Carreta de La Habana.
Valls opened Versailles in November 1971, on Miami 8th Street, probably the most popular restaurant in Little Havana, a neighborhood where the Cuban lifestyle is recreated. In addition to being a tourist attraction, Versailles became a meeting point for opponents of the Government of Havana and a reference for political demonstrations or electoral acts, which have been attended by various US presidents, such as Bill Clinton, George W. Bush or Donald Trump, as well as artists such as Beyoncé, Jay-Z, Gloria and Emilio Estefan.
Valls opened Versailles in November 1971, on Miami 8th Street, probably the most popular restaurant in Little Havana.
The Center for a Free Cuba released a statement this Sunday in memory of the figure of Valls, a reference to the Miami that was built by the emigration from the Island that arrived in this city in South Florida. Its president, Guillermo Mármol, paid tribute to “a Cuban-American patriot, civic leader, philanthropist and businessman.”
“For decades, his Versailles restaurant has been the meeting point for thousands of Cuban exiles and friends of a free Cuba, where they have come to support the aspirations for freedom of the millions of people who suffer under communism,” he stressed.
The establishment, with its large Versailles-esque mirrors, continues to be a sentimental reference for Cuban-Americans and the place where the end of Castroism is most talked about. Valls himself campaigned for the democratization of his country of origin and participated in the launch of the Cuban American National Foundation.
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