Orchard Lake Road's Newest Openings Have Been Here Before

"Coming back to Orchard Lake Road is incredibly meaningful because it gives us the opportunity to honor Tommy's legacy while creating something new for the future," Andy Stylianou said in a media alert about his new restaurant, AP Tommy's.

He means "coming back" literally. One week earlier, Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum said it would reopen within weeks in a new home on the same road. Both names have long histories on Orchard Lake Road, and both are opening there again this fall. This October, the corridor's most anticipated openings are not new concepts. They are places the road already knew.

A Greek Dining Room Finds Its Old Address Again

AP Tommy's is a 200-seat restaurant at 7410 Orchard Lake Road, just north of 14 Mile. Stylianou named it after his mentor and father-in-law, Tommy Peristeris. He was born Athanasios Peristeris in Mouzaki, Greece.

To Detroit diners, the Peristeris name means Greektown. He was an owner of Old Parthenon and New Parthenon. The Detroit News recalls that New Parthenon opened in late 1989 with six levels, tall Greek columns and a waterfall. In West Bloomfield, the name means something closer to home. He also ran Big Daddy's and Little Daddy's Parthenon, and Big Daddy's sat on Orchard Lake Road.

Big Daddy's was a neighborhood spot with a following. In June 1997, Crain's Detroit Business described it as an unofficial gathering place for the Red Wings. The family kept cooking after it closed. Stylianou and his wife, Eleni, Peristeris' daughter, run Big Tommy's Parthenon in Novi. Stylianou says many guests from the West Bloomfield years kept coming to see them there.

That is the case for AP Tommy's as a homecoming. The customers already exist, and some of them have been driving to Novi for this family's cooking. "West Bloomfield has always been part of our family's story," Stylianou said.

The menu as described by The Detroit News:

• Greek standards: moussaka, charbroiled lamb chops and saganaki
• From the grill: whole grilled fish, beef kabobs and bone-in filet mignon
• Family signatures: the Tommy's chopped salad and a family-recipe spinach pie
• At the bar: wine and cocktails, served in what the paper calls an upscale setting

The restaurant's website lists dinner hours of 4 to 10 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 4 to 11 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and noon to 9 p.m. Sunday. It also lists a bar-only social hour from 3 to 6 p.m. The site gives a phone number but no reservation link, so calling is the surest way to plan an early visit.

Patch reported on Sept. 30 that AP Tommy's expected to open Oct. 6. The Detroit News said only that it could open as early as the following week. As of Oct. 4, treat that date as the target, not a confirmed opening night.

The Arcade That Moved Up the Same Road

Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum spent more than three decades on Orchard Lake Road, just not in West Bloomfield. Its history moves in steps:

1. 1980: Marvin Yagoda, a pharmacist and collector drawn to magic, sideshows and circuses, starts showing an egg-laying-chicken game at Tally Hall. He later expands into a rented space there.
2. 1988 to 1990: Tally Hall closes in 1988, and Yagoda reopens the museum in 1990 at the plaza that later became Hunter's Square.
3. 2017: Marvin's son Jeremy takes over.
4. January 2025: The museum holds its final weekend at 31005 Orchard Lake Road in Farmington Hills on Jan. 4 and 5.
5. 2026: A late-May reopening in West Bloomfield slips because of plumbing problems under the floor. In September, the museum says it will reopen in "weeks not months."

The museum didn't choose to leave. Farmington Hills approved a planned unit development that meant tearing down the Hunter's Square mall, and construction on the replacement project, which includes a smaller Meijer, is now underway. Its new home keeps it on Orchard Lake Road. It is moving into the former Sav-On Drugs at Orchard Mall, just north of Maple.

The new space is nearly three times the size of the Farmington Hills location. Getting there took a township decision first. The Detroit News reports that West Bloomfield's zoning board of appeals approved the relocation after granting exceptions for the site's distance from a residential area.

For anyone who hasn't been, a 2022 Cleveland.com profile described what filled the old space. It listed playable vintage coin-op games and pinball, animatronics, sideshow posters, the nose-picking "Disgusting Spectacle," "Marvin's Lunch Time," "The Guillotine," a Cardiff Giant replica, a Sing Sing electric chair and a singing alien. No published report yet says which pieces will be on the floor at Orchard Mall or how they will be arranged in the larger room.

"I'm so excited about the opportunity we have been given to bring you all a bigger (Marvin's Marvelous Mechanical Museum)," Jeremy Yagoda said. He said an exact date will come once inspections are done.

Where Each One Stands This Week

As of Oct. 4, the two returns are at different stages. A third Orchard Lake Road arrival is new to the area entirely and is still waiting on a date.

Game Day Social's timeline has already slipped once. A July report from WhatNow quoted an expected opening the following month, and that window has come and gone. Of the three, it's the one to check on before driving over.

The two returns, by contrast, have a built-in audience. One family's name has been on this stretch of road before. The other business spent more than 30 years in Farmington Hills, farther south on the same road. When either one opens, plenty of West Bloomfield households already know what to expect.

Getting There While Walnut Lake Road Is Closed

Many residents reach Orchard Lake Road from the east, and one of those routes is closed right now. The Oakland Press road report for Oct. 2 lists Walnut Lake Road between Orchard Lake and Middlebelt roads as closed for culvert replacement, paving and pathway reconstruction. The posted detour runs via Middlebelt, Maple and Orchard Lake roads. Completion is projected for late November, and the same report says residents and businesses on both sides of the closure, east of Springwater Lane, keep access.

The detour has a practical side effect for this story. Maple is one of the posted detour streets, and Orchard Mall sits just north of Maple on Orchard Lake Road. Drivers coming from the Middlebelt side will pass close to Marvin's new home on the way around the closure, and AP Tommy's is a straight run north on Orchard Lake Road from 14 Mile. Late November is a forecast and could move, so check the Road Commission for Oakland County before planning a weeknight dinner around it.

A restaurant named for a man who once fed the Red Wings on Orchard Lake Road, and an arcade full of a pharmacist's oddities that moved up the same road, both show how much of West Bloomfield's character lives along that corridor. If you own a home near Orchard Lake Road and wonder how the new activity around 14 Mile and Maple might affect your property's value, Jessica Stencel can walk you through it. Request a free home valuation.