Tag: Broad Avenue Arts District

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CannaBeat: Cannabis Restaurant Headed for Broad Avenue

Credit: Buds & Brews

Tennessee’s first brick-and-mortar cannabis bar is slated to land in Memphis soon.

The former Bounty on Broad space will soon become a Buds & Brews location. No timeline for the opening was given in a news release.

Nashville-based Buds & Brews opened its first restaurant and bar in that city’s Germantown neighborhood in 2022. It will open a second location in East Nashville later this month. 

The restaurant allows patrons to “enjoy cannabis in a safe, legal and fun environment,” the company said in a statement. It offers a unique menu of upscale bar fare like the Buds Burger, hot chicken tacos and a Wake and Bake Brunch.  

Credit: Buds & Brews

“We are excited to bring the Buds & Brews experience to Memphis,” said Michael Solomon, owner and president of Craft Cannabis, the restaurant’s parent company. “This dynamic arts community is the perfect location for a new and innovative restaurant and bar concept.  

“We are proud to collaborate with some of the best in the food and beverage industry in order to bring Tennesseans a truly unique culinary adventure.”

Craft Cannabis is an umbrella group for three brands. Craft Cannabis offers seed-to-shelf cannabis flower grown in Nashville. That brand also offers an array of edibles like cannabis cookies, gummies, and suckers. Tri-Star Medical offers cannabis tinctures, capsules, and topicals. Sticky Tomato has a full line of gummies. 

At Buds & Brews, diners can choose their favorite condiment sauces infused with Tennessee-grown-and-extracted hemp-derived THC. The restaurant will also have a craft cocktail menu, cannabis-infused cocktails like the Smoky Margarita and Spliff Sangria, beers on tap, their own brand of THC-infused beers and New Highs seltzers, and dessert edibles.  

Bar Leafy Green was slated to become Memphis’ first cannabis restaurant. Owners announced the plan on social media in 2022. It is unclear, however, whether the restaurant ever opened.

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We Recommend We Recommend

Paint Memphis’ One-Day Paint Festival Colors Broad Avenue

Rendering of a mural that will be painted this weekend at Paint Memphis’ festival (Photo: Courtesy Paint Memphis)

They say watching paint dry is boring, so watching paint be painted must be exhilarating. Who can resist the sloshing of brushes, the smell of wet paint, the thrill of a slow, controlled stroke? Oooh, do you have goose bumps yet? Well, if your goose isn’t properly bumped yet, oh boy, it’ll be bumped at Paint Memphis’ one-day paint festival, where more than 150 artists will paint Broad Avenue Arts District red, and blue, and purple, and pink, and … pretty much every color out there.

This year, artists of all styles from throughout the country will paint 50,000 square feet of wall space along Hollywood, Broad, and Scott streets. “This year we have over 34 buildings we’re painting on,” say Paint Memphis’ director Karen Golightly. “So it’s totally different than we’ve done before. I think our max before was like six or seven. It’s really pushed us to engage more than we ever have, just to really partner with so many different businesses and residents and building owners, so that we can make sure we are communicating a positive message to the community and really trying to reflect this community, its history and its vision for the future.”

Photo: Courtesy Paint Memphis

In addition to the live painting, the festival will include around 50 vendors, a hands-on mural workshop by Zulu Painter, a skateboarding workshop by Society Memphis, a performance by Memphis Hoopers, a henna demonstration and performance by Kumar Indian Dance Troop, and a children’s hands-on makers space.

Plus, for the first time, Paint Memphis will feature pop-up galleries at Memphis Current, Meaty Graffiti, and Vice & Virtue Coffee, where the artists, all of whom volunteer their time for the festival, can sell their work. The galleries will be open Friday from 5 to 8 p.m. and throughout the day Saturday.

Overall, Golightly wants to bring more public, accessible art to Memphis. “One of the best things is that it has become a place where people can go and be proud of their neighborhood,” Golightly says. “I’ve seen the data on it that transforming gray walls anywhere into beautiful murals lowers crime, draws more tourists there, and can reflect the neighborhood.”

Paint Memphis, Broad Avenue Arts District, Saturday, October 8, noon-6 p.m., free.

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Letter From The Editor Opinion

Same City, New Eyes

Back in the days of lockdown (Photo: Jamie Harmon)

To anyone who may have been driving around Memphis last weekend, please accept my sincere apology. I was playing tour guide to my aunt and uncle, who were visiting from North Carolina, and, being somewhat distracted, I made what my sister called some “interesting” driving decisions. So if you saw someone still stopped at a green light, pointing out a particular piece of architecture or a local landmark, that was probably me. I hope I didn’t make you late for an appointment.

Besides being absolutely roasted for my inability to be a somewhat competent distracted driver, the day was a delight. My aunt is from Memphis and my uncle was stationed here when he was in the Army many years ago, so they’re not totally new to the city, but it still felt like a chance to see my hometown with new eyes.

Before I delve into our itinerary, know that I know we barely scratched the surface of any meaningful Memphis to-do list. But I tried to cater to everyone’s personal interests as much as possible.

First, we went to Crosstown Concourse, which my aunt pointed out has been much transformed since its time as a Sears building. Indeed.

We took in the last day of photographer Jamie Harmon’s “Quarantine Portrait” exhibition, and I was struck again by the power of so many faces seen through so many windows and screen doors. Though I had seen many of the portraits before — even written about Harmon’s work while it was still in progress — seeing them all collected was another experience entirely. Though I don’t truly believe we’re fully out of the Covid woods just yet, it brought home how much has changed in the past two years. Often, perhaps as a side effect of my profession, I tend to focus on the seemingly negative changes — the loss of trust, the fragmentation of communities — but I was forced to confront the many ways things are better than they were in April 2020. It was a catharsis to revisit that time from the safety of an art gallery, and with loved ones in the same room. That is a blessing I must endeavor not to take for granted.

While at Crosstown, we stopped at the little reading area, where my nephew enjoyed finding books about dinosaurs. It’s a place I’ve walked past many times but hadn’t taken the time to appreciate. How many such spots must there be in town?

Next, we made our way to Broad Avenue, to give the out-of-towners a chance to peruse some arty knick-knacks and to reward my nephew with some ice cream after his patience with the exhibition. He’s 4 years old, so his tolerance for the gravity of any situation is tenuous at best. My fiancée, who is passionate about the built environment, enjoyed being able to talk about the work done in both locations. My nephew enjoyed a cup of chocolate ice cream and the faux-flower-wearing skeletons at Sugar Ghost Ice Cream and Bubble Tea.

We spent a little bit of time talking about and looking at Summer Avenue, then we hopped back on North Parkway to hustle down to Greenbelt Park by the Mississippi River. It was a sunny, breezy spring day, and there were picnickers, joggers, dog-walkers, pot-smokers, cyclists, and everyone in between enjoying it. There’s something special about being close to the river, and we all felt it. Until I accidentally knocked my nephew off a tree while we were playing some game in which we were both (I think?) territorial spiders locked in bitter combat. Oops. Everyone was okay, though it was decided that perhaps it was time to move on.

We drove through the South Main Arts District, where my uncle used to pick up his contacts. We talked about the trolleys, the changes, the things that had stayed the same. We drove past a busy FedExForum and saw young people popping wheelies on ATVs. We waved as we passed both business and entertainment districts Downtown, and I pointed out a billboard of Ja Morant in the Vitruvian Man pose.

Eventually we made it back to my house to make dinner and play board games, not unlike how we used to spend so much time at my Grannie’s house when I was a child. It was modest, but not without its own magic.

I guess, in many ways, that’s true of Memphis, too.

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Food & Wine Food & Drink

Salt/Soy to Open in February

CREDIT: Camille Jones

Salt/Soy is slated to open in February in the Broad Avenue Arts District.

The goal is to get the restaurant at 2583 Broad “up and going before Valentine’s Day so we can do omakase, a Japanese tasting menu,” says owner/sushi chef Nick Scott. “Usually, the omakase chef comes up with a tasting menu on the fly. This is something we’d set; three or four courses.”

Salt/Soy was hosting pop-up omakases Thursdays through Fridays at Alchemy, which Scott also owns. The pop-up events were “mainly a preview for what’s to come,” he says. They were “a huge success. The lines couldn’t get through the door.”

Camille Jones

Alex Moseley, and Brad McCarley

When Salt/Soy opens on Broad, the menu will include vegetarian and pork ramen bowls. The restaurant’s general manager, Brad McCarley, who Scott worked with at the old City Block Salumeria, is “curing all the meat in-house. We’re fermenting our own miso, our own kimchi. We’ll let that inspire the direction we go in. He’s got a ‘fried chicken and dumpling’ dumpling. It’s incredible.”

There are talks of doing a dim sum brunch on Sundays, but offering it between noon and 6 p.m. instead of earlier in the day.

But Salt/Soy isn’t going to limit itself to serving one type of food, Scott says. “We’re not pigeonholing ourselves to only doing Japanese. It will be Asian-inspired; pulling from all cultures and melding them together.”

And, he says, “I’m also looking for some Pacific inspiration there. We might throw in some tiki stuff. We may do some riffs on classic tiki drinks. We’ve talked about that. The overall menu — the food menu, the sushi menu, and the cocktail menu — is going to be really fun, exciting, different.”

Salt/Soy began as a pop-up in 2018 at Puck Food Hall. The idea was “sushi and seafood with ceviches and different types of crudos,” Scott says. And “market-style fish and seafood by the pound.

“The next stage we started looking for brick and mortar. We looked at a lot of places. We knew Lucky Cat [Ramen] went out of business, unfortunately. And there was a lot of talk about it within the industry, a lot of people who wanted to get in there. I had some real estate contacts who lead me in the right direction, and it kind of fell in my lap.

“It was a no-brainer,” he adds. “They had everything built out and ready to go. We changed a few things, but not a lot. That happened in October.”

The concept for the new location is “less of a market concept and more of an izakaya sushi concept,” Scott says. “A Japanese drinking establishment, with Japanese tapas, serving small plates. People come in and have drinks and cocktails.”

Downstairs will be “a little more upper-scale dining,” he says. “We’ll have the patio, which will evolve over spring and summer — a massive patio. And then upstairs will be more of a late-night, rock-and-roll situation. Kind of a little more gritty than downstairs. We’ve talked about getting a Bluetooth record player up there and playing only vinyl.”

Bar manager Alex Moseley came over from Alchemy. McKenzie Nelson, who was at Lucky Cat and High Noon, also will be behind the bar. Both bartenders are “very creative,” Scott says.

The restaurant has been given an artful makeover. They repainted the interiors and brought in an artist, David Johnson, to survey the space to determine how he could bring his own creative vision into the mix.

Scott says Johnson outfitted some of the downstairs spaces with paintings that work with the restaurant’s new color scheme. “His artwork is black and white with pops of color — and [the pieces] will be for sale.”

The restaurant’s name already adorns the front door. Scott can’t wait for that door to open to the public. “It’s going to be a fun place.”

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Lucky Cat Ramen Announces Closure

In a Facebook post today, the owners of Lucky Cat Ramen announced the restaurant’s closure.

Lucky Cat kicked off in Memphis with a series of pop-ups in 2017 before opening its original brick-and-mortar location at 247 Cooper. The restaurant moved to 2583 Broad in 2018.

Read the full Facebook announcement below:

 

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Food & Drink Hungry Memphis

Dine-in at Bounty on Broad Will Resume June 16th

Customers can eat inside Bounty on Broad beginning June 16th.



Bounty on Broad will reopen its dining room June 16th.

They will continue to do curbside, but they didn’t want to open the dining room early, says executive chef Russell Casey. “I guess we were kind of seeing how the health department would move into phase three,” he says. “Since that’s happening on Monday, we’ve decided to move ahead.

“We’re probably only going to fill up to 50 percent occupancy. Put a few tables outside on the sidewalk. Seems like people just poking around town feel more comfortable being outside.”

And, he says, “Everybody is taking their COVID test and all that. We’re very conscious of keeping the spacing between the tables correct and just following what the health department says.”

They want the public to feel safe, Casey says. “All of our cleaning procedures have always been stringent. We want the public to know we’re going a step beyond that. It’s something we take seriously and we always have. Now, with the pandemic, we’re stepping up our game even more. We want the public to know things are sanitary and fresh and good to go.” 

The restaurant will offer a limited menu. “We’ve done curbside and a lot of hospital catering through the worst of it. That’s kind of tapered off.”

They will feature five items on the menu. “We’ve got a fish, a pork, a beef, a vegetarian, and a chicken [dish] on there. So, we’ve kind of hit all the bases and kept it limited.”

Their most popular curbside items include the eggplant lasagna, the salmon with rice grits, and the half-roasted farm-raised chicken with wild mushroom risotto, all of which will continue on their menu. “We’re going to add things to it. Our main thing is to keep things fresh and to keep the quality the public expects and has grown to love about Bounty.”

“We’re going to play it by ear the next couple of weeks and see how the public responds to things. We’ll make a decision on a day-to-day basis on how we’re going to move forward.”

To view the menu, go to bountyonbroad.com

Bounty on Broad is at 2519 Broad Avenue; (901) 410-8131

Bounty on Broad executive chef Russell Casey

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News News Blog

Arrow to Build New ‘Forever Home’; Passes on Plan for MCA Space

CREDIT: Paradigm Marketing and Creative

Paradigm Marketing and Creative

A rendering of the proposed Arrow building in the Broad Avenue Arts District.

Arrow, one of the organizations that had bid to take over Rust Hall next year when the Memphis College of Art closes, has pulled out of consideration and will instead set up its headquarters in the Broad Avenue Arts District.

Abby Phillips and Dorothy Collier, co-founders of the nonprofit creative co-working space, made the announcement Monday evening at Arrow’s temporary space at 2535 Broad.

Arrow has raised about $2 million toward acquiring the property and will mount a capital campaign to get another $10 million.

“The space will be more than a building, more than a program, and more than just studio space,” Phillips said. “Arrow will be a one-roof creative district in the heart of Memphis. We will house micro retail opportunities, creative community education with a focus on workforce development and artist development.”

It will have studios and creative offices, as well as co-working and shared equipment. Arrow has acquired some of the equipment from Memphis College of Art that will be available to the Arrow community.

“This space provides a unique opportunity with easy access,” she said. “We are 20 minutes or less of a drive from anywhere in the city, the street is already an established and thriving arts district, and over the next few years, there will be over 400 apartments in the surrounding five blocks.”

The 80,000- to 100,000-square-foot project is expected to take more than a year. Meanwhile, Arrow will remain in its temporary “concept” space that has six studios and already has artists working there. “We wanted to be closer to our forever home and to prove our concept that access to foot traffic does help these artists,” Phillips said.

Arrow is also offering classes and hopes this summer to have a summer camp for students much like MCA has offered for many years.

The city has selected several finalists who have proposals on what to do with the 75,000-square-foot MCA building, which will become vacant at the end of the 2019-2020 school year. Arrow had been one of the finalists. The city is also looking for ideas for the 86,000-square-foot Memphis Brooks Museum of Art, which plans to move Downtown in 2024. 

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News The Fly-By

Bikesmith Opens Shop in Broad Avenue District

When Jim Steffen started fixing bicycles in the back of his Bikesmith truck, he noticed that many cyclists liked to stick around and watch the repair process. Now, they can watch the repairs and drink beer at the same time, and all in the comfort of a brick-and-mortar shop.

Steffen has expanded his mobile repair business into a shop on Hollywood, right in the heart of the Broad Avenue Arts District. In the new shop, customers can sip craft beers while they wait.

For years, Steffen’s Bikesmith truck, a converted freight truck, has been serving people in neighborhoods without bike shops. But the business’ growth over the past year warranted a new shop for Steffen, who got his start fixing bikes with the Shelby Farms Park Conservancy’s bike rental program.

With his Bikesmith truck, Steffen has been able to serve cyclists as far east as Collierville and in some locations in Mississippi.

A look inside the Bikesmith shop

“For some people, going to a bike shop can be a little intimidating,” Steffen said. “I think people get nervous when they go to a bike shop if they don’t know bikes. They just want it to work. I think having the truck took some of that anxiety out of people. A lot of people wanted to come on the truck and see what I was doing.”

Steffen says he’ll continue to operate his mobile business, but customers can also visit his brick-and-mortar shop. The new shop is in a renovated automotive garage, complete with repair racks and a bar. There’s also a patio and some green space in the back, which Steffen is considering adapting into a bike polo court or a “pump track,” a looping trail system for mountain bikes.

Visitors are invited to ask questions about their bikes and chat while their machinery is being worked on, and they can enjoy beers and sodas while they wait.

“With our repair stands, we have this bar with stools there,” he said. “When David [Evans] and I are working on your bike, you can sit there and watch us work on your bike. We wanted to have everything out in front so you can see it. We wanted to make it more than just a bike shop.”

Steffen and his wife have a history with Broad Avenue: They volunteered on the street when it was going through the city’s MEMFix revitalization program, and they participated in art walks.

With the implementation of the Hampline bike path along Broad, Steffen said the arts district seemed like an obvious choice.

“It’s really easy for people to get their bikes down here,” Steffen said. “It’s really close to [Overton Park]. You have the Hampline. We wanted to have a place where people can bike to the shop. I don’t think there’s another place in town that would be as perfect as this building is.”

At the Bikesmith shop, visitors can also purchase their own bicycles and bike accessories.

The shop is celebrating its grand opening on December 6th with food, beer, and a raffle giveaway for a kid’s bike.

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News The Fly-By

New Design Plan for Broad Avenue Water Tower

“The third time’s a charm” is the case for the ever-evolving design plans for the Broad Avenue Arts District’s iconic water tower.

Local artist Tylur French of Youngblood Studios began a mural painting project on the water tower this week after two previous design plans for the tower fell through. Lighting designer Jeremy Fisher will complete the project with color-changing LED lights.

“The businesses on the street wanted something that would have daytime and nighttime appeal. And Tylur and Jeremy were able to come up with options that honor the iconic shape of the water tower but also provide this great beacon for the street,” said Pat Brown, vice president of the Historic Broad Business Association.

New design plans for Broad Avenue water tower

French’s design will feature a topographic image of the Mississippi River that will wrap around the barrel of the tower. His team began building scaffolding and safety structures last week, and he said they should begin painting by the end of this week.

“The location on the river where Memphis is will be a starburst,” said French, who also designed the bike gate entrance on the East Parkway side of Overton Park. “When you look at it from the top, it will look like a map. But on its side, that water line becomes a horizon with a sunrise. It’s really indicative of the spirit of everyone on Broad.”

Fisher, a lighting designer for Theatre Memphis, will be installing colored LED lights on the tower over the next month or so.

“The lights will be controlled by a computer that will fade through the colors throughout the night,” Fisher said. “For the holidays, we may do red and green lights. Or for Griz games, we can make it all blue.”

French and Fisher’s plan replaced a more ambitious, costly plan by New York artist Suikang Zhao to install a perforated metal ribbon around the tower. Zhao was chosen for the project by popular vote during the Crosstown Arts MemFEAST event in 2014. He was allotted $65,000 from an ArtPlace America grant for the project, but Brown said the actual implementation of Zhao’s vision ballooned well beyond that.

“There was a national search for artists, so they had not seen the space,” Brown said. “And then you get into the cost of the crane [to get the sculpture onto the tower]. There were concerns about asbestos and affixing something to the water tower. The costs grew to well over $200,000.”

Back in 2010, around the time of the “New Face for an Old Broad” event that reactivated the street into an arts district, Loeb Properties had hoped to cover the tower with a digitally printed wrap mural, but they ditched those plans when they learned it might begin to lose its color after three years.

French said he wanted to make sure the tower’s shape wasn’t covered up.

“My goal was to design something that didn’t take away from the fact that it’s a really beautiful historic tower but would give it a more specific identity to the city and the community and the sprit of what’s happening on Broad,” French said.

French says the project is part of Youngblood Studio’s overall push for more public artwork in the city.

“A city with a lot of artwork is a more humane city, a more cosmopolitan city, and a more forward-thinking and liberated city,” French said. “To be a part of that is so unique and so exciting.”

Brown is just happy to see the water tower finally getting its facelift. There will be a lighting ceremony and dedication of the work at the fall Broad Avenue Arts Walk on November 6th.

“Everything works out, and it’s like the water tower knew what it wanted,” Brown said. “It’s great that it’s come back to local artists, and the third time is a charm.”

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News The Fly-By

Co-working Fabrication Shop to Open Soon on Broad

Think of Forge, the soon-to-open co-working space on Broad, as a gym for artists and makers. But instead of treadmills and yoga classes, Forge will offer soldering irons, sewing machines, and workshops on how to build things from wood, among other features.

The art space and fabrication shop at 2493 Broad will offer several levels of memberships, and members will be able to come in at their leisure and use equipment ranging from metal- and wood-working tools to screen-printing equipment to 3D printers.

“If you’re into building furniture or jewelry, this can be a place to come and blow off steam after work or on the weekends. Or if you’re really working on something you want to sell, we’ll have business and entrepreneurial workshops to help with that,” said Forge founder Elizabeth Lemmonds.

Lemmonds has been working on getting Forge open for about a year, and she says, if all goes as planned, the space should be open next month. Opening a co-working fabrication shop is a dream for Lemmonds, who previously helped launch new companies at Start Co. and, before that, ran a grassroots arts organization called Lantana Projects.

“There’s always been this part of me that is obsessed with people making things, and I’m not even that good at making things myself. But I’m mesmorized by watching [artist] Eli [Gold] weld or watching the 3D printer print some architect’s vision,” Lemmonds said.

She’d heard about co-working spaces in other cities, but they weren’t coming to Memphis. So she took things into her own hands and secured a two-story space on Broad.

“I would see these coming into top-tier cities, and they had no plans for Memphis. I thought, why not Memphis? Why not now?” she said.

Elizabeth Lemmonds

Downstairs at Forge is mostly reserved for hands-on arts and crafts. There’s a large warehouse space with stations for members to work on small projects with clay, textiles, sewing, or screen-printing. A separate room is reserved for artists who weld, do wood-work, or anything “loud, dirty, and dusty,” Lemmonds said.

There’s also a conference room/art gallery downstairs near the entrance. Currently, a show by the Caritas Village artist-in-residence Bill Piacesi is on display.

“I wanted a conference room for additional revenue opportunities, and because you’re probably not going to organically walk into a maker space on Broad. But if I can get you in here for something else and give you a chance to see what’s happening, that’s my way to get more eyes on what’s going on,” Lemmonds said.

Upstairs, there will be a co-working space with wifi, desks, software, and white boards. And that space will house the 3D printer, a large format printer, and a vinyl plotter that is used to cut window decals.

Forge will also host community workshops that will be open to the general public, no membership required.

“We’re taking requests for workshops that fit into this whole DIY ethos,” Lemmonds said. “We’ve had people say they want workshops on home-brewing and floral arranging. And maybe even a zombie apocalypse workshop with basic survival skills.”

Much of the initial funding for Forge has come from crowdsourcing. So far, Lemmonds has raised $5,700 of her $6,000 goal on GoFundMe.com. The fund-raising campaign is still open, and Lemmonds said any donations that go beyond the goal will be used to purchase additional equipment for members. The campaign can be found at gofundme.com/forgememphis.