From Modern Times:
Here’s the deal: a couple of months ago, the folks developing The North Parker building at the corner of 30th St and Upas got in touch with me. They thought we might be a good fit for the last remaining commercial space on the ground floor of the building.
I was highly skeptical, and in fact, I didn’t return their call for a month. I wasn’t even remotely in the market for another project, being plenty busy with our existing tasting room and, ya know, running the brewery, which is only six months old and needier than a dozen shrieking baby marmots.
But I ended up meeting with them, and, well, here we are, announcing our second tasting room, The North Park Flavordome.
Here’s what convinced me to do it:
- The other tenants. We’ll be in the same building as Underbelly 2, La Perla (the taco place from the very cool people who brought you The Pearl Hotel), and Influx coffee. As a North Park resident, I’m just hugely excited about what those businesses will bring to my neighborhood, and I wanted to be a part of it. The folks from Consortium (Underbelly) and LWP Group (La Perla) played a key role in convincing Jonathan Segal (the architect/developer) that we would be a good fit for the space, which made me feel hugely welcomed and honored since I have so much respect for what they do. I really feel that they’re collectively making San Diego a better, more interesting city to live in, and I want to help them do it.
- The location. We’ll have a tasting room on 30th St.—‘Murica’s Finest Beer Motorway—or whatever they’re calling it. Seriously, 30th St. has a national reputation as a craft beer destination, and this gives Modern Times a big, beautiful showcase right on it. But I wouldn’t do it if I weren’t totally confident that this will also be a boon to the places in the neighborhood that already carry our beer by helping us build a local fan-base. Win-win.
- The building. I’m convinced that the building will really help activate the southern section of 30th St in North Park. There are already great businesses around the 30th/Upas intersection, but The North Parker is going to help build critical mass, which will benefit everyone in the area. On a philosophical level, I’m also fully on-board with the idea that multi-story, mixed use buildings are the most sustainable, desirable form of development in a city that suffers from a major excess of sprawl. I only wish it were taller.
- The space itself. It’s going to be really, really cool. There’s 1,624 sq ft of interior space and two of the walls are made entirely of glass, with views right onto 30th St and into the lovely main walkway to the complex. There’ll also be two sizable outdoor seating areas, and if there’s anything San Diego desperately needs more of, it’s great places to drink local beer outdoors. Seriously, how is it that San Francisco and New York—cities with often lousy, depressing weather—have more good outdoor drinking spaces than San Diego? This must change, and we will help make it so. We’ll have 16 taps, and the space will be decorated in the gonzo DIY spirit of the Lomaland Fermentorium.
So that’s pretty much all the news for now. The project is in the very early stages, and we have a great deal of work left to do. I will hazard a guess that we will be open sometime in the spring/summer, but beyond that, there are just too many unknowns for me to say anything with authority.
Oh, and one final thing: we tapped a very special beer at the Lomaland Fermentorium this week: Black House with bourbon barrel-aged coffee beans. This blog postoffers all the details on how this unique and remarkably flavorful beer was made. There's still a bit left, but it would be unwise to wait too much longer.
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