With the longest lease on the space they’ve ever been given, Stuart Duckworth (of Little Miss everything and The Crown and Anchor fame) and his team have finally built the open-air venue they’ve wanted all along.

“It wouldn’t be us if it didn’t rain the day before or the day of,” Stuart Duckworth laughs, as he guides CityMag around the potted plants and workers’ equipment just rushed under Roxie’s recently weatherproofed verandahs.

“Probably to your eyes it looks like there’s still heaps more to do, but it’s more so just setting up.”

Chairs are stacked out of the weather, and the tradies pulling together the last pieces huddle wherever they can, but nonetheless, the differences between Roxie’s and previous iterations of the space that was once Superfish, Crab Shack, Little Miss Miami, etc, etc, are clear .

Stuart and his crew have finally achieved semi-permanent tenure of the open-air location, and though he stresses demolition is still inevitable, the longer lease has allowed for longer-term thinking.

“For me, that is to build a space that doesn’t feel like it’s only going to be there for four weeks,” he says.

A greater emphasis will be placed on the lushness of the garden; the kitchen has been removed from the front of the space and replaced with more seating for punters, and all cooking operations are now in the back of the venue.

More of the original building is on display, and this less-is-more approach is a consequence of the team Stuart has assembled for this project.

“I don’t know why we overcomplicated it with so many themed decorations before,” Stuart says.

“The first thing we did when we moved in as Little Miss Mexico – not that we had the foresight then – was we said ‘fuck it, let’s see what’s underneath the gravel,’ and we picked up this gravel, and we were like ‘amazing! There’s red bricks!’

“[That] was the first time we’d actually really looked at using the elements that we have here and taking it back to those elements. I think it took these other people that we’re working with now, such as Jordan [Jeavons] and Carlo [Jensen, who designed the new façade, which was painted by Kaspar Schmidt Mumm], to help remind us that that’s the direction you should head.”

Roxie’s will share the Chateau Apollo kitchen, but the majority of the food offering will consist of dishes cooked on flame, via the grill, or in the newly built wood oven, which was constructed by father and son team, Jordan and Russell Jeavons.

“Russell Jeavons, I would consider him food royalty in SA, starting what is the institutional Russell’s Pizza, and so to have him come in and very generously lend a hand, I think that’s a really nice touch,” Stuart says.

The soft launch weekend will have a limited menu of about five items, and while nothing was locked in at the time we spoke, Jordan hints that the food will be “sort of halfway Middle Eastern, Greek, Italian”.

“What we’re kind of doing is almost doing a Turkish pizza style, doing flatbreads with roast vegetables or roast meats, slow-cooked things in the wood oven,” he says.

“That’s going to be things like slow-cooked lamb out of the oven, chicken off the grill, barbecue eggplant.”

The wine list has been curated by Koen Janssens in collaboration with Tom Skipper, and will slant towards small batch producers.

“We’re just trying to keep it fresh and local, and those guys that are doing under that 1200 cases per annum,” Tom says.

“Jauma… things like Delinquente and Frederick Stevenson – just small batch stuff, Ochota Barrels as well.”

The soft launch will also celebrate Chateau Apollo next door, which has not yet had a launch event of its own, and Stuart says it will be the first example of what the space’s live music potential could be.

“Chateau Apollo will have events ongoing that are open to the public, but it won’t traditionally be a place where people can come and go,” he says.

“It’ll normally have an event on of some kind, but now and again we love the idea of throwing some gigs in there and supporting live music in this corner. The Crown and Anchor’s done an amazing job of doing that for decades before we’ve been doing it, and so we want to take that ethos of great South Australian live music.

“This is just the first showcase of that, and we’ll also showcase how people can move between the two spaces.”

Shaolin Afronauts will be the band breaking in the space from 8pm tonight.

With all four venues up and running, CityMag asks if this feels like the end of a long and drawn out saga for the lads, as it’s certainly seemed like one from afar.

“Ever since we moved in here and saw the excitement of the four-week project of the first Little Miss Mexico, we always wanted to keep on using the space, and that’s why we’ve gone through four different licences to get to this point,” Stuart says.

“We didn’t know we would achieve this, we didn’t know this would become a reality when we started, it always felt like a challenge, but it felt like a challenge that may or may not end.

“So yeah, it does feel like a saga’s coming to an end somewhat, but… its not so much the end of a saga, but another achievement and a step towards doing what we were looking to achieve.”

Roxie’s soft launch weekend kicks off at 6pm tonight, Thursday 16 November, and will continue from 5pm on Friday, Saturday and Sunday. Starting next week, the hours will be from 5pm on Wednesday and Thursday, and from midday on Friday through to Sunday, and the venue will be open all year round.