The South City/South of Forum neighborhood got some excellent news yesterday: An anchor tenant for the neighborhood is moving in. You may remember a couple of years ago, Wiseacre Brewing Co. had plans to expand capacity and production by acquiring space in the Mid-South Coliseum. That fell through, but Wiseacre kept searching for a location. Yesterday they announced a plan to purchase land and open a 40,000 square foot brewery and taproom in the South City area. The area will be bounded by B.B. King, Vance, Abel and Butler – so the southeast corner of B.B. King and Vance, basically. The taproom’s entrance will be on the Butler side, so this will be convenient for South Main people. As a matter of fact, I can see some good synergy between the brewery taproom and the soon-to-open Slider Out which will be a couple of blocks away on Mulberry.
Wiseacre is applying for a zoning variance because at 40,000 SF, the space will be too big to qualify as a microbrewery. The original brewery and taproom on Broad will remain open, but will focus more on specialty beers.
This is fantastic news for that area. There have been times when I have followed Downtown’s street hustlers doing their fake “can you help the homeless” spiel in the Downtown core, and after getting the necessary cash they walked down to Abel Street, where I assume they scored drugs. About 11 years ago it got bad to the point where I headed a group to keep tabs on panhandling Downtown with my friend Mike King, and for years I advocated wiping Abel Street along with Allen Street one block over completely off the Downtown map. A brewery and taproom will go along way to rehab the street. Brewery taprooms tend to be hubs for the local community and the Downtown Wiseacre one will draw lots of foot traffic.
Penny Hardaway’s Memphis Tigers play Oklahoma State in the first round of the Advocare Invitational today at 2:30 on ESPN2. The winner of that game plays the winner of Villanova-Canisius tomorrow.
Daisyland at the New Daisy has announced plans for Blackout! on New Year’s Eve. Seven DJs perform in the ultimate light and sound experience, with lights out at midnight.
Make plans to stop by the 409 South Main Market the night of November Trolley Night, Friday, November 30, for the first-ever South Main Holiday Market.
Shab Chic, the shipping-container shopping center in The Edge at 607 Monroe, will have a holiday market of its own weekends between now and Christmas. Hours will be 4-7 Fridays and noon-7 Saturdays. On Sunday, November 25 and Sunday, December 23 the market will be open noon-4.
Tuesday night the City Council stayed in session until midnight and took 101 votes, unsuccessfully trying to get a 7-vote majority to fill an open seat in District 1 (Raleigh). The vote will now continue at the next Council meeting in December, but the Council will be even less likely to get to 7 votes, because two council members will have rolled off the council by then. Your city government in action… perhaps I should delete the space between “in” and “action” to make the description more accurate.
Memphis Made will open its taproom early tomorrow, at 1 PM, for Black Friday. Prize for the first 25 people to show up, and there will be free donuts too.
First place in Blind Bear trivia last night!
It was mostly Thanksgiving trivia, and having been to trivia night on Thanksgiving week before paid off… there are only so many questions that can be asked about the holiday.
I see that an organization with which I was associated for quite some time has a new skipper. Congratulations to him.
About to head out to two Friendsgiving celebrations. Back tomorrow with more news.