Boondoggle has big plans for long-vacant Masonic temple
Historic Wethersfield building to become brewery, restaurant
WETHERSFIELD — A long-vacant former Masonic temple on Main Street in Wethersfield is being renovated into a brewery and Mexican street food restaurant by Boondoggle Beers.
Micah Kerr of Wethersfield, who owns Boondoggle, said he hopes renovations to the 97-yearold building at 245 Main St. will be done in time to open his eating and drinking establishment this year.
“When people ask me, I like to tell them Oct. 1. But I can’t guarantee anything so realistically, the hope is this calendar year,” Kerr said. “We probably won’t be brewing on site this year because there’s a big difference between a certificate of occupancy and approvals to brew on-site.”
Boondoggle brews beers at Shebeen Brewing Company in Wolcott, Cottrell Brewing Company in Pawcatuck and Still Hill Brewery and Tap Room in Rocky Hill.
Kerr said that after “severely deferred maintenance” is done to the building and the restaurant is built out, it will eventually become a five-barrel brew house, but some beers still would be brewed off-site.
Boondoggle, which first started selling beer in 2017, has an air travel theme. Terminal North No. 1 is an amber ale. Gateway to New England is a vanilla milkshake-flavored double IPA. Arrival is an IPA. Departure is an American pale ale. Layover is a double honey IPA. Tarmac is an imperial stout. Jet Lag Haze is a New England India pale ale. Vacation Haze is a session ale. Baggage is a coffee porter. East Terminal E01 is a farmhouse ale. West Terminal W01 is a double brut IPA. Non-stop is a stout. Non-stop to NOLA is a stout with chicory.
Two other beers are The Baywolf, a honey IPA, a tribute to Kerr’s grandfather, and Red Beach, a hoppy red named after a town in New Zealand where Kerr once lived.
Kerr would not name the chef who will create the line of Mexican street food for his eatery. He did say “My goal is to not have any plates or silverware. This will be real street food.”
The building, at Main and Church streets, was built in 1924 as a Masonic temple. It has been empty since 1997. Town Planner Peter Gillespie said people have proposed plans to renovate the property, but none have moved forward before now.
“Back in the late ’90s, a plan received several different approvals and town variances for the renovation of the building. It was going to be mixed-use office and residential, a very elaborate renovation. It was elaborate and costly. They came back in 2003 with a less ambitious plan. It was less grandiose and also approved,” but did not happen either, Gillespie said.
Years later, a plan was proposed to renovate the building into apartments, but “once he costed it out he never went forward.” Another plan, to turn the property into an assisted living facility, caused an outcry in the community and was denied by the planning and zoning commission.
In 2013, the town got a grant from Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation, to hire a consulting firm to determine what needed to be done to the building, he said. The report’s conclusions made it clear that renovating it to make it usable again would be expensive and that commercial use would be ideal.
“The bottom line is, by nature of the building’s age, a significant cost would be associated with any type of development. It would be a big challenge for someone to take on,
and there should be modest revenue expectations expected from the project,” he said.
Kerr said the restaurant and brewhouse will open in a phased approach, as the development progresses, first the eating and drinking area on the ground floor and later, expanded rooms to host events.
“When upstairs opens, it will be a place for programming. It will be a beer hall and a place where somebody can have book club meetings, an author can do a book signing. There can be Ted talks. If Uconn makes the Final Four I will show the games up there. There will be a full wall I can project on to. We’ll show World Cup Soccer,” he said.
According to Wethersfield Historical Society, two buildings
were originally on that site and were moved to construct the temple. One was a Grand Army Hall for Civil War veterans. The other was Horse Car Railroad Depot, which had a restaurant, bar, meat and fish markets and a confectionary. “For years, this was the only hotel in town and the only place licensed to sell liquor,” town historical documents state.
Kerr said he is happy the site will be used for eating and drinking, as in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
“We’re returning it to its prior use, where people used to meet. Back then they likely made their own beer,” he said. “It’s kind of cool to reactivate this building.”