USA, VA: Businesses teaming up to open brewery, restaurant in downtown Fredericksburg
Owners of two breweries and the owner of a restaurant were looking for a place to merge their Northern Virginia businesses when curiosity drew them to downtown Fredericksburg, fredericksburg.com reported on February 6.
Zack Mote and Ryan Sharkey, co-owners of Water’s End breweries, and Mike Sarago, who owns Hot Chikn Kitchn, didn’t have Fredericksburg Square on their list of prospective sites, but couldn’t resist taking a peek when they saw that the historic, three-story brick building at 525 Caroline St. was for sale.
“We were intrigued. It was 19,000 square feet and so we decided to stop and be nosy,” said Sarago. “We walked in and we were like, what an awesome, fabulous place this is! Our minds ran wild with what we could do here.”
“We absolutely fell in love with it,” added Mote, who is president of Water’s End.
He and Sarago began negotiations to purchase the property in 2019, but had to push pause due to the pandemic and the passing of Van Perroy, who’d owned and operated the building with his wife Deborah for nearly 25 years. The deal was finalized last December and the partners hope to open there this spring.
“The focus is not going to be just the brewery. It’s going to be an entertainment center, if you will, which includes a brewery and Hot Chikn Kitchn,” said Mote.
He, Sharkey and Sarago recently discussed their plans while sitting in Fredericksburg Square’s spacious first floor ballroom, which features high ceilings, brass chandeliers, a fireplace, hardwood floors and handsome wooden bar. They plan to leave the space the same, although they have hired Fraser Wood Elements at 1023 Caroline St. to make new tabletops.
The idea is to offer a casual taproom in “a very unexpected, upscale environment,” Mote said.
Fredericksburg Square will offer seven beers from the Water’s End locations in Lake Ridge and Woodbridge at first, including the flagship Damn Beer Golden Ale and Don’t Haze Me Bro! IPA. The partners eventually plan to build a 1,840-square-foot brewery building in the rear yard of the property and add a biergarten. They hope to expand their tap list and brew beers that reflect local tastes. Wine and liquor will be available as well.
The new location will offer the W.E. Beer Club, which is also available at the other two Water’s End sites. It offers such perks as discounts, merchandise and access to exclusive events for an annual fee.
“It wasn’t created as a moneymaker,” Mote said. “It’s to build a community.”
Hot Chikn Kitchn will also operate on the first floor. It specializes in such Nashville-style hot chicken fare as sandwiches, tenders and wings that derive their heat from sauces rather than rubs. They come in four levels, ranging from Base, which is infused with cayenne pepper, to Medic, which blazes with Carolina Reaper pepper.
Fredericksburg Square’s ballrooms were a popular venue for weddings and other special events under the Perroys’ ownership, and the new owners said they envision a similar use for those spaces. They also foresee using the upstairs ballroom, which was most recently known as The Cabaret at Fredericksburg Square, as a setting for local musicians and comedians at some point.
The rollout of activities will be done in phases and reflect input from the community, they said. They’ve already created a Facebook page for Fredericksburg Square that has more than 200 followers.
Having a Fredericksburg location is a sort of homecoming for Mote and Sharkey, who will manage the taproom. The two friends both went to Massaponax High School and Sharkey still lives in Spotsylvania County while Mote moved to Manassas. Sarago said he likes the area so much he will open another Hot Chikn Kitchn location in Stafford County.
The three met after Mote and Sharkey opened the first Water’s End in Lake Ridge. Sarago had a restaurant nearby, but closed that to open his first Hot Chikn Kitchn in Potomac Festival, a shopping center in Woodbridge. Mote and Sharkey decided to ask for his help when they were planning to open a second Water’s End there. Sarago told them he was already looking for an entertainment site and suggested they join forces.
Mote said he didn’t even know Fredericksburg Square existed when they stumbled upon it during their search. The Perroys had operated several businesses in the building after purchasing it from Elks Lodge No. 875 in 1996.
The more they learned, Mote, Sharkey and Sarago became as impressed with the building’s past as its potential. John Grymes, who owned nearby tobacco warehouses, built a townhouse on the site in 1854. It survived the Civil War and passed through several hands before the Elks purchased it in 1905 and converted it to Lodge No. 857.
Members added a large addition in 1925 and leased the ballroom to the U.S. Post Office for 10 months to help pay for it. At the time, the postal service was remodeling its building at the corner of Princess Anne and Hanover streets. The vault that the Post Office added to the lodge is still there, and is used to store kitchen equipment, Sharkey said.
During the Depression, the Elks set up a soup kitchen and fuel yard on the property to help the needy. Members also volunteered their building as the local induction center for draftees in the following decade and as a local bomb shelter during the Cold War, according to research done by Historic Fredericksburg Foundation Inc.
“It’s our desire to share the history of the building,” Mote said. “This building has been a focus of the community. We’re just the newest custodians.”
10 February, 2022
