Maru, the upscale Asian fusion sushi restaurant on Town Center Drive, will shuts its doors Dec. 12 after more than 11 years in Valencia, owner Jason Park said.

“After months of trying to negotiate a lower lease with Westfield, we were refused for a final time,” Park said in an e-mail.

Park said customers should hurry and make reservations, “as I am sure we will be very busy.”

His e-mail signaled the end of his Valencia business but suggested new opportunities might be around the corner.

“We are looking for a few more investors to complete funding for the next project,” Park said.

Jason Park’s bio from Maru’s website

From earliest childhood, Jason Park was exposed to creativity as well as quality in cuisine. After graduating college in Japan, his grandmother returned to her native Korea and created her own skillful mix of the two cooking styles, mingling the delicate flavors of Japanese with the bolder Korean cuisine. These highly individual recipes along with her techniques for preparing them were passed along to Jason’s mother as well as the great emphasis she placed on the importance of being clean and organized in food preparation and cooking. The food was always served as exquisitely as it was prepared, and Jason will smile as he tells you that no one ever refused his mother’s invitation.

It was in this home that Jason’s dreams of becoming a Chef were first nurtured. While encouraging him to develop his already sensitive palate, his mother taught him techniques of food preparation and cooking that instilled in him the importance of maintaining integrity in all that he did in the kitchen. Observant and highly motivated, he avidly watched cooking shows like Great Chefs of the World and Yan Can Cook and learned from them. From these early beginnings, a life-long love of fine cuisine was born.

Jason briefly turned his back on his love for cooking to pursue his other passion, the sciences, as a Biology major at UCLA. But after two years of hard effort at his studies he had decided to work with his hands. At the beginning of his third year, Jason decided to change his major to Psychology and also entered the Culinary Arts Program offered through the University’s Extension Program. He would become a Chef. After making this decision and graduating from the program he further honed his chef skills at various fine dining restaurants in the Los Angeles area as well as performing a stage at Ka Gai Ro, a Kaiseki restaurant in Osaka.

The validation of his life’s dream has been the tremendous success and critical favor that his restaurant, Maru, has enjoyed since its doors opened in 2001. Jason Park has never had to look back in his eleven years as a restaurateur.