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Friday, October 14, 2016
Raleigh beer and wine lovers, who’ve seen their boozing options expand exponentially over the past few years, will soon have even more variety, thanks to the Crabtree Beer Garden at Crabtree Valley Mall, Pourworks, which will open in a space at the Manor Six Forks Apartments, and a bottle shop for the beloved Trolley Pub.
As first reported in the Triangle Business Journal, the former Tomato Pie restaurant was closed at the end of September, and the 4,200 square foot space will be transformed into a pub and bottle shop named the Crabtree Beer Garden.
The concept will be very similar to the Brier Creek Beer Garden, also owned by Payman Bazooband, which opened in April. The bottle shop at Crabtree will reportedly offer more than 300 varieties of beer, and the majority of its taps will feature North Carolina Beers, according to the Raleigh Agenda.
$10,000 worth of permits for work at the Crabtree Beer Garden were issued October 6 to Gleeson Controls.
Pourworks, which bills itself as “Raleigh’s premiere craft beer & wine shop” signed a retail lease with Manor Six Forks, located at 900 East Six Forks Road in North Raleigh, in early September. On October 5, Integrated Commercial LLC received $98,000 worth of permits to begin fitting out the space for Pourworks.
Pourworks/Facebook
Plans for Pourworks
I actually live pretty close by to “The Manor” — I’ve been a frequent visitor to the adjacent Bojangles — but had no idea there was going to be any sort of retail component to the place. Especially a retail component that only sells booze. I remember settling on my first post-college apartment in large part because it was within stumbling distance of several bars; if I’d found a place that had a beer shop built into it…forget it.
Of course, Pourworks aims to be more than just a place you pick up a sixer before heading back to your studio apartment to drown out the miseries of your day. The owners want to foster a congenial, welcoming environment where everyone can stop in, have a drink and get to know their neighbors a little better. The earliest post on their Facebook account talked about how they want to “ensure that we identify and align with what the residents and customers want.”
We liked one of their next posts even better, and not just because we agree that Cheers is one of the all-time sitcom classics:
Rounding out the trio of taverns receiving permits last week was none other than the Trolley Pub Bottle Shop, something we reported on way back in April. Of course, the excellent Amanda Hoyle over at TBJ had published something nearly a week before our post. Oh well.
On October 5, an $1,800 permit was issued to a contractor named, appropriately enough, Redwine Renovation, for work at Trolley Pub’s current headquarters at 323 W. Davie Street.
Titled “Trolley Pub Bottle Shop” the permits describe the work as involving some minor demolition and the addition of walls and shelving “for a bottle shop within existing trolley pub — adding mercantile area to existing storage building as a non-separated mixed-use occupancy.”
In his interview with Amanda Hoyle, Trolley Pub proprietor Kai Kaapro also discussed plans to add a restaurant and an event space for their guests — I call them Troll Riders — to enjoy before or after cruising around town in the Trolley Pub.
Troll Riders in all their debauchery
It would appear from these permits that the only thing being added at this point is a space from which to sell beer. This makes sense: Troll Riders are currently required to pre-purchase their booze, as the mobile, pedal-powered “pub” doesn’t actually sell beer. I imagine the BYOB aspect of it has something to do with ABC permitting, but who knows. The point is, Kaapro can now cut out the middleman and make the whole Trolley Pub experience that much more convenient: no need to stop at the Harris Teeter beforehand.
While I’m no fan of the Trolley Pub myself — it’s tacky and touristy and it ties up traffic; I was stuck behind one last week on Boylan Avenue, of all places — it’s hard to be too spiteful of a successful business owner whose concept has done so well he can now expand it into other avenues. Heck, I’ll even toss in a nickel’s worth of free advice: if the bottle shop is going to have a seating area, Kaapro should install a bunch of those “DeskCycle” machines as a way of simulating all the fun the Trolley Pub has to offer.
Also receiving permits last week:
- The Angus Barn out on Glenwood Avenue will have a $400,000 heavy-timber canopy (this must be some canopy!) installed at their front entrance by Quality Builders.
- Red Wing Shoes will apparently be opening a second location at 3408 Olympia Drive in a space previously occupied by Enterprise Rent-a-Car. The store, which claims to provide Raleigh with ” the highest-quality work footwear, accessories and care products,” currently operates out of a space at 3200 South Wilmington Street. Renovation work at the new location is being handled by Caliber 1 Construction for $117,155.
- Renovations have begun in suite 1200 at 421 Fayetteville, also known as One City Plaza (nee One Bank of America Plaza), for the new offices of the City of Raleigh’s Housing & Neighborhoods Department. As reported by the Triangle Business Journal back two months earlier, City Council on August 2 authorized the City Manager to move forward with the 7 year lease. The initial rate will be $26.95 per square foot, which will increase 2.75 percent each year beginning in 2018. According to the City Clerk’s report of that meeting, the space will allow increase departmental efficiencies via co-location. “Following a search of available properties, a suitable lease site was identified at 421 Fayetteville Street. The lease premises would be located on the twelfth floor and contain 15,684 rentable SF. Consolidation of department staff in the leased space as proposed will free up work space in other city facilities for reallocation and to achieve additional staff efficiencies in other departments.” If you don’t feel like doing the math, that works out to $422,683 for the first year, $434,306 for the second, and so on. Owned by Highwoods Realty, the historic tower was recently renovated and acquired by Highwoods and is home to a number of well-known Raleigh businesses. The renovation for the new Housing and Neighborhoods office will be handled in-house by Highwoods at a listed cost of $417,391.
- Diamond Contracting will be slumming it out at Weaver Brothers Volvo (IMO, Diamond should work exclusively for Lamborghini and Ferrari dealerships), where they will be undertaking a $153,500 renovation of Weaver’s existing service area.
Wake County
One City Plaza
