About the Gallery & Restaurant
video of gallery resto with food and guests
The Apolo R. Tirol Gallery offers a dining experience like no other. Leisurely explore Apolo's sculptures on display in our art gallery by the sea. The location itself offers one of the best night views in Bohol. An exquisite dinner at our gallery restaurant will highlight your visit.
We are open every Wednesday to Sunday from 4:30 pm to 10:00 pm.
We require table reservations at least a day in advance.
You may reserve here:
Check out our menu here:
Get 10% off your entire bill by pre-ordering your meal upon reservation. We do charge a ₱1,000 reservation fee per table, which will be deducted from your total bill.
Why a gallery restaurant
Art and food are perhaps God's greatest gift to mankind. Making them requires skills and mastery that are more similar than we think. For one, they are both best experienced by all our senses. Seeing art, and even more so a sculpture, in print or on a screen fails to capture the artwork's energy. And food is definitely not meant to be seen but to be gastronomically savored.
Both are also media for emotions and self-expression. And lastly, art and food are both made using our hands. This is meaningful because we believe that the work of our hands is the physical form of our souls within.
When you visit the A.R.T. Gallery Resto you get to experience the magic of both gifts-- that of art and that of food. We look forward to welcoming you.
We invite you to take a look at our menu here.
Our
Story
"A.R.T. Gallery & Restaurant is all about taking second chances."
The Apolo R. Tirol Gallery & Restaurant, nicknamed, A.R.T. Gallery Resto, is a project that is all about taking second chances.
This unique establishment is a joint project of spouses Apolo and Cristine Tirol. The concept was born out of their individual quests for simply making dreams come true, believing that it is never too late to chase rainbows.
Both are late bloomers in expressing their creative sides. Apolo was 53 years old when he discovered his talent in creating metal sculptures. Cristine was 36 years old when she went to Pastry School at L'Academie de Cuisine, in Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA.
Apolo and Cristine first met in 1985 during their high school years in Tagbilaran City, where they were both members of the Leo Club of Tagbilaran. Both were very shy and while they were certainly interested in each other, nothing progressed beyond stolen glances, friendly smiles and wishful thinking. In 1987 Cristine graduated from high school and moved to Manila to pursue a Bachelor's degree in Business Economics at the University of the Philippines in Diliman, Q.C.
Since then they had parted ways, but little did they know that the Universe had other plans for them. They pursued entirely different lives, totally oblivious to any updates on the other's life. Both had married and had children with their first spouses. Apolo had stayed on in Bohol, except for a short stint in Qatar in 2012. Cristine had stay on in Manila and later moved to the Washington, DC, USA area from 2004 to 2010. In 2005 she went to culinary school and subsequently worked as assistant pastry chef at Le Paradou, a French restaurant in the Penn Quarter area of Washington, DC under Chef Yannick Cam. She also worked as pastry chef at Persimmon Restaurant in Bethesda, MD under Chef Damian Salvatore.
As much as she loved working in restaurants, the demands of motherhood overcame that career path. So she pursued a different, more practical path, which led her to seek a second master's degree, this time at Harvard University. She briefly worked for the main office of World Wildlife Fund in DC, but life took an unexpected turn.
lIn 2010, Cristine had returned to live in Manila and built a career as a political researcher. In 2019, she moved back to Bohol after Uma and Radha went back to the US to pursue their college educations. By 2021, both Apolo and Cristine had been single again, and both living in Bohol during the pandemic of 2020-2022.
They met again, first online on Facebook, after his profile passed by her feed. She was looking for persons selling organic vegetables. After a series of messages they reconnected in Panglao in October 2021-- after 35 years. The decades may have changed how they looked, but the spark had always remained. They married a year later, and their union birthed two beautiful dreams--- Apolo's dream of being a sculptor and Cristine's dream of being a chef/restauranteur. And here we are.