Pancake house, hair salon welcomed to Jasper Ave.
Dutch-style pancakes and blowdried hairdos are set to bring life back to a long-vacant commercial space on Jasper Avenue.
De Dutch, a Surrey, B.c.-based chain of pancake restaurants, is opening its first Edmonton location in June in the main floor of the Cambridge Building, a former office tower converted into a residential condo complex in 2003. It’s located at 10024 Jasper Ave.
The main floor will also be home to a Ricci blow-dry hair salon.
Other tenants are also being sought for the 30-year-old building’s base- ment, once home to Churchill’s Restaurant, one of several underground restaurants that dotted downtown Edmonton in the 1960s and 1970s. They will be the first tenants, besides a chiropractor, to move into the building’s commercial space since the late 1980s or early 1990s, said Kent Mckay, secretary for the building’s board of directors.
A legal dispute over ownership of the space prevented leasing out the space until recently, he said.
The building also just completed a facelift with a grant from the City’s facade-improvement program, which helped attract tenants, he said. The building’s board and the Downtown Business Association are optimistic that the new businesses will help revitalize the building and its share of Jasper Avenue.
“It’ll be great to have more life along that stretch of Jasper Avenue,” Mckay said. “We have a huge amount of Jasper Avenue exposure, and no commercial tenants means that it’s a pretty grey, pretty dingy kind of stretch. It’ll be nice to have tenants in there to keep it clean and lively and provide activity at different hours of the day.”
Jim Taylor, executive director of the Downtown Business Association, said the Cambridge is located on a highly visible part of Jasper, close to three hotels, ATB Financial’s future corporate headquarters and a redeveloped Telus Plaza.