Bru is the third recent addition to the Downtown dining scene:

– Azul, a Mexican-themed restaurant, opened Dec. 9 in the St. Joseph neighborhood.

– New Orleans on the Avenue, a Creole-based eatery, opened in November at 543 Indiana Ave. in a building that most recently housed Zing restaurant.

BRU: If hand-dipped milkshakes aren’t enough, the family-friendly establishment also offers a wide selection of draft beers and a full-service bar.

The gourmet specialty burgers include the Bru, which fetures taleggio cheese, bacon, tomato jam, braised onion, chopped lettuce and tomato. Or  there’s the Mount Olympus, with a wide variety of ingredients including pepperoni, feta cheese and kalamata olives. Another early customer favorite is the Provencal, which boasts basil aoili, red onions, herbed goat cheese and marinated portabello mushrooms.

Other specialty burgers boast such names as the Black and Blue Bacon Burger, the Ahi Tuna Burger and the Mexicali BBQ Burger. The list of “Classics” includes The Beginning, Patty Melt and Classic Bacon Cheeseburger.

Bru offers a few sandwiches beyond the burger, based on such items as pulled pork, chicken, spicy hot mettwurst and a shrimp po-boy.

Appetizers range from the standards such as Chili Cheese Fries to the more avant garde, a Roasted Tomato and Goat Cheese Strudel.

Jonathan Feldhaus is general manager of Bru, which is the second Mass Ave venture for Cunningham Restaurant Group. That Avon-based company opened Mesh, an upscale dining establishment, in the fall of 2010. Josh Ray, bar manager, said Bru is intended quality neighborhood feel where customers cantbck, relax and have a good conversation.

Bru is located in space formerly occupied by Elements. The space has been expanded, however, to give Bru a stronger presence on Mass Ave. The restaurant will seat about 100, plus another 50 to 60 spaces on the patio which faces Davlan Park at the corner of Mass Ave, Alabama Street and Vermont Street.

Entry to Bru is gained from Davlan Park, on the right side of the new addition. Hours are 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays and 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Sundays.

NEW ORLEANS ON THE AVENUE: One recent customers was shocked because she could see “a whole crawfish” in the Etouffee. “But it isn’t Etouffee if there isn’t a whole crawfish in it,” countered Bridget Brown, owner of the Creole eatery which was launched at 543 Indiana Ave. in mid-November.

Indianapolis has had a good serving of fast-food offerings from Louisiana, but not so much in the way of finer dining. That’s what New Orleans on the Avenue offers, with a variety of entrees priced under $20.

Brown, a native of southern Louisiana and a former soccer player at Louisiana State University, has lived in Indianapolis for 17 years, operating a small catering business. “But it’s been my dream to open a restaurant, and its finally coming true.”

Brown said first-timers might want to try the Taste of New Orleans, a combination platter with Jambalaya, Etouffee, Gumbo and two pieces of Fried Catfish. Other favorites include Red Beans and Rice and a New Orleans Pork Chop. There are also shrimp, oyster and catfish platters, plus the Ultimate Creole Seafood Platter.

The pride of the appetizer menu are the Fried Boudin Balls, composed of pork, rice and blended Creole seasoning rolled in Italian bread crumbs. The six-inch Seafood Pizza is also an early favorite, Brown said.

New Orleans on the Avenue is open 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays, 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Fridays, noon to 10 p.m. Saturdays and noon to 9 p.m. Sundays.

AZUL: This Mexican-inspired restaurant opened for dinner only on Dec. 9 in the the former home of The Bar at the Ambassador at the corner of 11th and Pennsylvania streets. By the new year, or perhaps earlier, the restaurant will be open 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. for lunch and dinner.

As of Dec. 20, the dinner-only menu featured a variety of appetizers and salads plus quesadillas, burritos, enchiladas, fajitas, and hard and soft tacos. Some not-so-Mexican tortas (sandwiches) included tenderloins, swiss burgers and grilled ham and cheese.

But once the hours are expanded, Azul will offer a wide variety of ceviches, sauteed shrimp dishes, seafood dishes such as the Al Veracruzan, sauteed white fish in Veracruzana sauce; and the Diabla, fresh fried fish sauteed with a mild chipotle sauce, green peppers and onions served with rice and beans.

The expanded menu will also include seafoord platters and specialty dishes such as Pollo Ranchero, grilled chicken breast and chorizo on pasta with poblano chile sauce; Salmon; and Fish Tacos.

Jackie Nytes served 12 years on the City-County Council.

Public Library.

But as most eyes are focused on the door that’s opening for the long-time Mapleton-Fall Creek resident, there are also two doors that are swinging in the opposite direction. As she prepares to return to the library system she once served as associate director and chief financial officer, Nytes is ending two tenures:

- As executive director of the Mapleton-Fall Creek Development Corp., a post she has held the past four years.

- As a member of the Indianapolis and Marion County City-County Council, where she served 12 years representing the very diverse District 9. That district includes all or parts of several Urban Times neighborhoods, including St. Joseph, Chatham Arch, Old Northside, Herron-Morton Place, Fall Creek Place, Meridian Park and Watson-McCord.

Nytes, whose background in financial management put her at the forefront of many key city issues, leaves city government proud of several key accomplishments, especially in some areas where she said “we made some tough choices.”

Chief among those was the sale of the water company to Citizens Energy Group and the creation of Fall Creek Place.

Nytes said earlier in her tenure she voted for the city to buy the water company, “and at the end of the day I voted to sell it.” She said her earlier vote came because the water company was on the block and she believed the City needed to buy it to keep it out of the wrong hands. “But we experienced difficulty running it.” She said the idea was to put the operation one step away from the political process – “but that wasn’t enough.” Now, she believes it is in the right hands with Citizens, a nonprofit charitable trust.

As for Fall Creek Place, Nytes said City leaders were correct in “being willing to do a large-scale urban re-investment.” Fortunately, she said, the first several phases of that project occurred while the housing market was still hot. She said many people don’t fully appreciate what that project did to the tax base. She said the convention industry uses a term, “heads in beds,” which also applies to the whole city.

Jackie Nytes speaks during a program marking one of her favorite Mapleton-Fall Creek success stories – the house at 2930 Park Ave. which was the first home sold in the neighborhood after renovation funded through the Neighborhood Stabilization Program.

But Nytes had the most direct impact on two very divergent issues – human rights and local taxing. “There are two pieces of specific legislation I feel awfully good about,” she said – the human rights ordinance and the County Option Income Tax.

As for the former, Nytes, a Democrat, and Scott Keller, a Republican, sponsored a change in the City’s Human Rights Ordinance, adding both “sexual orientation” and “gender identity”’ as protected classes from discrimination in employment and housing in Indianapolis.

It was not without controversy – but none like that generated by an increase in the County Option Income Tax. Nytes’s strong advocacy of that change brought her a lot of heat from her own party, but she remains convinced that the move was necessary because local government was far too dependent upon property taxes. “We needed to diversify funding for local government,” she said, noting that the County Option Income Tax hadn’t been changed in years, and that nearly all other Central Indiana taxing districts had taken advantage of higher rates allowed by the State. “It was an opportunity to look at an alternative way of funding local government,” she said. “We have a shrinking property tax base, and needed to diversity. I am proud of having helped fight that fight.”

Nytes said one determining factor in her decision to champion that cause was because the end result was for the “common good.” She holds that term dear. “I hang a lot of my votes on that.” Another example – the Duvall work release program, which many people felt was located too close to the Windsor Park neighborhood. Nytes said the community needs to successfully move people from prisons back into society – and that programs to accomplish that goal must be located close to services such as public transportation and jobs.

Taking a broader look at her dozen years on the City-County Council, Nytes said, “It has been fun to look at the neighborhoods and see how much many of them have accomplished together. She praised residents of neighborhoods such as Chatham Arch, the Old Northside and Herron-Morton. “People came together, and nobody wrote them a blank check. It makes you realize the power of people banding together to get something done.” A lot of home tours, she observed.

Nytes was able to experience that on a more first-hand basis when she took the job four years ago leading the Mapleton-Fall Creek Development Corp. It was, she said, an exciting chapter in her life. It was also a job in her own backyard. She and her husband, Michael O’Brien, lived at 3510 N. Pennsylvania St. in 1977, after which they bought an abandoned house at 3009 N. Pennsylvania St. No doors, no plumbing. In 1982 they moved to 3110 on the same street, before moving in 2006 to their current house on Washington Boulevard in Meridian Park, restoring a grand home which had been converted to business use for many years. For that restoration, the couple earned an award from the Historic Landmarks Foundation of Indiana.

“I had the chance to do full-time in a small neighborhood the kind of stuff I wanted to have every neighborhood do in my district,” she said. Mapleton-Fall Creek became a laboratory for those ideas. While progress hasn’t come at quite the pace she had hoped, she draws solace from remembering that the urban pioneers who turned around the historic Downtown neighborhoods didn’t accomplish that goal overnight. She draws comparisons between the current Mapleton-Fall Creek pocket park effort to the Old Northside Foundation’s successful efforts to create Great Oak Commons and Shawn Grove Park. If Nytes leaves with one unfilled goal, though, it’s that another $100,000 is needed to fund the park project, despite the 50-percent tax credit available.

She noted that the Mapleton-Fall Creek effort has evolved into a “most holistic discussion about what it takes for a neighborhood to succeed, such as schools. She said successful neighborhoods also have parks, shopping, walkability – “and jobs, so that people can make their lives here. Districts are the healthiest when they’ve got a more complex array of things going on.”

She is optimistic that the Mapleton-Fall Creek community will continue to improve, citing the work now being done on a Quality of Life Plan, a step which played a vital role   in the recent progress being made on the Near Eastside.

She is optimistic that the Mapleton-Fall Creek Development Corp. will continue strong after she cleans out her desk. “They’ve got a good board that is really vested,” she said, as well as good partners with financial clout. “And the residents are stepping it up.”

Not that the work will be easy. Progress has been too slow to hold people in the neighborhood or attract enough new residents and businesses. The development corporation itself had caused some problems through poor management of properties it owns, a situation Nytes believes was solved through a partnership with the Whitsett Group that led to the revitalization of 50 units of rental housing.

She said federal funding through the Neighborhood Stabilization Program has jump-started some programs, but progress remains slow because the housing market has not rebounded. “But I’m not complaining,” she said. “We got a solid start.”

She remains buoyed by the spirit she sees in the neighborhoods. “At the very grassroots,” Nytes said, “you’ve got people struggling to make their rent payments, but also people working with other bright people interested in making sustainable neighborhoods.”

As Nytes winds down her time at the Mapleton-Fall Creek organization, she has thought about how her experience there and on the City-County Council has played into her return to a world with which she is very familiar. She began as a public librarian in 1975 and led the Carmel-Clay Public Library from 1981 to 1988.

“A sabbatical can be a good thing,” she said, noting that her time working with neighborhoods as city-county councilor and at the development corporation has given her a different perspective. “I’ve come to see the value neighborhoods and the community place on their individual libraries,” she said.

At this writing, a formal date for her ascension to the library throne had not been determined. She expected to make the move soon after the first of the year. And while she winds down her time at Mapleton-Fall Creek Development Corp., there is a sense of some wistfulness. Not so much with the City-County Council.

“When you’re a veteran on the council,” she said, “the days seem shorter because there are so many more people you need to talk to, so many more issues you track, so many more meetings.”  By the 12th year, she said, she felt like she was only getting to a fourth of the meetings she should have – yet she was going to as many as ever.

She is also a bit tired of hearing people demand their streets and sidewalks be repaired. “They want everything from local government,” she said,, “and property tax caps at the same time.”

Despite that bit of cynicism, Nytes is bullish on the system and the city.

“We have a really good city,” she said. “I really think so. There are a lot of folks running things really well, making many of the changes that will make that better.”

- Bill Brooks

Tim Harmon and Julie Crow are pooling their talents to launch a new business on East 10th Street.

Tim & Billy’s Salvage Store. Crow is probably best known for her former Modern Times vintage clothing store at 54th and College in Indianapolis

They are pooling their experience and talents to open a new venture – Tim & Julie’s Another Fine Mess, to be located at 2901 E. 10th St. in a key redevelopment node of the 10 East Business District.

The store will feature a blend of architectural antiques salvaged from demolished homes and businesses; vintage clothing and textiles; and assorted artwork, handicrafts and other goods manufactured before 1960.

The business will also evolve into a center for artistic and practical “up-cycling,” where vintage and antique components are fashioned into new products, such as a table made from an old window sash, or a purse made from an antique curtain. The store is planned to open in the spring of 2012.

“It’ll be a very amusing and funky store,” Crow said. “We’ll have a lot of odd things in Another Fine Mess – everything from fabrics, to lamps, windows and doors, to furniture. The possibilities are only limited by our imaginations and what we can find, and we both have a knack for finding oddities,” she adds.

The first-time business partners say they will spend approximately $100,000 of their own money to renovate the building to accommodate their retail space. They will receive bonus grants from the East 10th Street Civic Association as they achieve key renovation benchmarks, beginning with a façade grant from the association that will be used to replace the plate glass windows, woodwork and doors on the storefront.

The building had been acquired by the East 10th Street Civic Association, which was looking for just the right tenant for the area. Tammi Hughes, the association’s executive director, said her organization was very enthusiastic about the proposed business, in part due to Tim’s years of experience in saving old homes from demolition.

The approximately 6,000 square-foot-building was built in the early 1900s by Edward Vahle to house his hardware store. After Vahle retired in the 1920s, the two-story brick building was also home to a number of different neighborhood retail businesses, including a general store, a physician’s office and an art supply store. The building also has two upstairs apartments, which Crow and Harmon say they will also renovate, and are considering living in when complete.

Mama Irma Restaurant offers the eclectic cuisine of Peru, which has been influenced primarily by Spanish, African and Japanese immigrants.

“I’ve been, literally, cooking the idea of this restaurant for 30 years,” said Cano, a native of Peru who has brought the culture and cuisine of the Andean nation to the heart of Fountain Square.

Mama Irma Restaurant is located in a cozy room at 1058 Virginia Ave., next to Joe’s Cycles and across from the Murphy Arts Center. “Mama Irma” was Hilda’s mother, who taught her how to cook, and how to love others through food and family traditions.

“This restaurant is a monument to Irma, and her legacy continues through the things I learned from her in the kitchen,” Cano said. For her, cooking is a passion; making people happy through delicious Peruvian food is her goal. And she doesn’t want her customers to just taste the food, she wants them to get a taste of Peruvian culture too. The restaurant’s lively atmosphere and decor will introduce diners to Afro-Peruvian music, along with some special surprises.

Modern Peru is built on the traditions of the indigenous Inca people, and shows the influence of three immigrant groups – Spanish, African (Creole) and Japanese,  sprinkled with bits of Italian, French, German and Chinese.

Born in Lima, Hilda came to America at age 10 to attend school in Miami. There, she lived with her aunt and was a cherished part of her close-knit, extended family. She returned to South America at 15, and immersed herself in the culture and cuisine of her native Peru, becoming a tour guide and eventually running her own travel agency. Nineteen years ago she moved to Beech Grove. Then came a stint as an interpreter for federal agencies and running her own cleaning company,

Her new endeavor is a family affair, with Cano’s brother, sister-in-law, and her son joining together to provide financial resources and manpower.

Diners will see the diversity of Peru reflected on the Mama Irma menu. Appetizers will include ceviche made with fresh, seasonal fish and seafood, and Jalea, a dish of fried shellfish, fish, and yucca topped with a sliced onion salsa.

Potatoes will take center stage in papas a la huancaina, which features potatoes in a creamy Peruvian cheese sauce, and Causa, a cold mashed potato cake stuffed with chicken salad. Main courses will include Bisteck a lo Pobre, flank stake over french fries, with fried plantains and white rice, topped with a fried egg. Lomo Saltado, another beef dish, is a stir fry of flank steak, rice, tomatoes, and onions, tossed with french fries. Aji de Gallina combines chicken with a creamy sauce flavored with parmesan, walnuts, and spicy aji peppers.

Mama Irma Restaurant will also offer a lunch menu of fixed-price meals featuring an appetizer, entrée, and drink. On Saturdays and Sundays they will serve Peruvian breakfast with baked ham beginning at 9 a.m.

After seven years in the 700 block, Jessica Sage is now operating Sage at 431 Mass Ave.

why she stocks her boutique, Sage, with clothes she describes as “urban sophisticated, but also timeless and classic.

“If people are going to spend money for a piece,” she continued, “they want it to last for a long time.”

That’s the philosophy which worked for her when Sage spent its first seven years in the 700 block of Mass Ave. That run ended earlier this year, but Sage has now reopened at 431 Mass Ave next to Nurture and the Chatterbox Jazz Club.

Hamm opened the doors in mid-October, but plans a grand opening during Holiday Hoopla in early December. In the meantime, she is filling the recently renovated street-level space while also working on a stylish lower level which she intends at first to focus on local artists. “That’s still developing in my head,” she said.

Ultimately, the lower level will allow her to expand the Sage offerings, although she expects wall space to continue to accommodate art.

Sage offers ready-to-wear clothing from original designers, as well as jewelry and accessories. While a click glance pegs the demographic as young adults, Hamm said she has customers “from 17 to 70.”

Currently, Sage is open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays and noon to 5 p.m. Sundays, but Hamm said those hours may expand once she gets the feel of the 400 block of Mass Ave, where the vibe is distinctly different than her original location. Sage will also be open late on First Fridays.

Fletcher Place Arts & Books

Christie McNabb. “Here, we do things a little differently. You can walk in and look at the art, then grab some colored pencils and paper and create something yourself, or make yourself comfortable on one of the couches and read.

“It’s a quiet space in a noisy and chaotic world, and something we feel the community is really hungry for,” McNabb added.

Fletcher Place Arts & Books opened Friday, Oct. 7, at 642 Virginia Ave. with a reception for its first show, “Reflections on Guatemala,” featuring works by local artists Emily Janowiak and Jeff Litsey.

McNabb describes the venue as a unique collaboration of displayed art, a lounge area for reading, tables and chairs for working or creating and a library of books with titles centering around theology, art, literature and more. The Gallery will promote local emerging artists each month who are relatively new to the Indy arts scene and attendees will have the opportunity to respond to and engage the art.

A new exhibit will open at the gallery every First Friday. Fletcher Place Arts & Books will be open on Fridays and Saturdays until the end of the year, with the plan of extending hours in 2012.

For more information, contact go to http://fletcherplaceartsandbooks.wordpress.com/.

The 22 townhomes which line the east side of the 500 block of Park Avenue – their backs turned to a row of concrete

Preliminary drawings: The mixed-use project would be located on a 2.4-acre tract of land and feature 190 one- and two-bedroom rental units, 44,000 square feet of commercial space, and underground parking. (Illustration by A3 Design.)

foundations and a large expanse of scruffy unkempt land – stand as a reminder of two past failures to develop the large parcel along the 400 block of Michigan Street on Lockerbie Square’s northern frontier.

But those townhomes will finally get some neighbors, if a plan by the Whitsett Group comes to pass. North Lockerbie will live once again.

The Whitsett Group, headquartered within site of the proposed project in the 707 North building, has bought the 2.4-acre tract of land to build a mixed-use development which includes three buildings to house 190 one- and two-bedroom rental units, 44,000 square feet of commercial space, and underground parking.

The project is the third effort to develop the site since 2001. The first two were:

- A project by Young & Laramore advertising agency, unveiled in January of that year, to bring 80 residential units into five buildings, one of which was a 10-story tower, plus 70,000 square feet of office space and 30,000 square feet of retail space. That     project was sabotaged by economic factors following the 9/11 terrorism attack.

- A townhome-based project by Hearthview Residential, which included 70 “stacked” townhomes in 35 modules, plus 18 flats in a four-story mixed-use building which would have anchored the Michigan Street-College Avenue corner. The units facing Park Avenue were built, but the project launched in 2005 stagnated after economic forces collapsed the housing market.

If Whitsett’s application for tax credits is approved, building A would be constructed first, with work to begin next summer. Building B would come next. There is no timetable yet for Building C -- which Whitsett hopes can be home to a grocery store. (Illustration by A3 Design.)

Now comes The Whitsett Group, an organization which took over the partially built 707 North building, at the corner of College Avenue and North Street, and completed it as affordable housing. Whitsett is currently redeveloping the former Central Restaurant Supply building in the St. Joseph neighborhood for a mix of affordable and market-rate housing.

That, too, will be the formula for North Lockerbie, along with the commercial component. Joe Whitsett, principal of The Whitsett Group, said 55 percent of the 170 rental units planned for North Lockerbie would be affordable, while the rest would be market rate.

Laying out his plans at the Aug. 9 meeting of the Lockerbie Square People’s Club, Whitsett said his company has secured $13 million in local bank financing and $8.9 million from equity investors. The deal is contingent, however, upon the awarding of federal tax credits. That determination won’t come until February, meaning the project would not begin construction until September 2012.

In the meantime, Whitsett and his architect, Dave Gibson of A3design, plan to present the project to the Indianapolis Historic Preservation Commission in October. For major projects, the IHPC has established a precedent for such preliminary hearings, where no vote would be taken, but developers could get a sense of any potential IHPC concerns.

North Lockerbie features three mostly brick buildings – only two of which would be built in the first phase. No timetable has been set for the third building, which  would anchor the Michigan Street-College Avenue intersection, although Whitsett said his wish is to attract a supermarket to the first level.

Here’s a breakdown of the three buildings:

- Building A – Five stories, with 20,000 square feet of street-level commercial space and 68 apartment units on the upper levels. That building would have 55 below-grade garaged parking spaces, accessed from Park Avenue via the shared driveway behind the existing townhomes.

- Building B – Five stories, with 10,000 square feet of street-level commercial space, plus 102 apartment units on the upper four levels. The first level would also feature 55 indoor parking spaces to serve the development’s commercial leased space.

- Building C – Three stories, with 14,000 square feet of street-level commercial space and 20 apartment units on the two upper floors.

Buildings B and C would also feature 208 below-grade parking spaces accessed from a ramp off College Avenue on the northeast corner of the property. Whitsett emphasized that all of the required parking for the residential and retail components would be on-site.

A key component of the project is the reopening of Cincinnati Street north of Michigan Street.  Whitsett said he envisions small independent businesses, mostly restaurants, lining the pedestrian thoroughfare with outdoor dining areas. His idea is that the street would not be a vehicular thoroughfare to be used only by vehicles servicing the businesses.

In the short term, Whitsett promised members of the Lockerbie Square People’s Club that he would take immediate steps to improve the parcel. He said he has hired a landscaping firm to plant grass and keep the tract mowed.

Change number-one is that Nurture’s inventory will now include more of Martz’s own line, Elms and Cedars, which she has marketed the past five years at craft fairs such as the Indieana Handicraft Exchange. The store will also sell local and hand-made     products from other local artisans, such as those featured in the INDIEana Handicraft Exchange.

Martz isn’t new to the retail business, having worked the past 3½ years as manager of Pitaya women’s boutique in Broad Ripple. She has also worked for Galyan’s and Nordstrom, spent a couple of years in New York City, and holds a degree in apparel merchandising from Indiana University.

Nurture’s regulars will notice some décor changes, she said. “Plus, we’re increasing the display area and adding some fun things for kids to do,” she said. “Eventually, I want to move my production in-house,” she added, thinking of the store’s lower-level space.

“And I would like to make this into a hub for information – a newsletter or a website – where parents can get information about such things as kids’ camps or music lessons, the kind of information you need to raise a child

Ashley Martz will feature her own line, Elms and Cedars, at Nurture.

Downtown.” Those plans may not materialize immediately, because Martz is staying on at Pitaya through the end of the year.

Nurture was opened in November 2008 by Kristin Kohn, owner of At Home in the City/Silver in the City. Store hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays, 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays, and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sundays.

Heather Givans will offer fabrics, notions, threads and patterns in Crimson Tate Modern Quilts. (Photo by Kristofer Bowman)

the INDIEana Handicraft Exchange.

Now, following her two-year move to Duluth, Minn., Givans has returned to Indianapolis to open her first retail shop, Crimson Tate Modern Quilts. And while the shop at 845 Mass Ave will feature fabrics, notions, threads and patterns, Givans is thinking more about how people who sew, or who would like to learn to sew, need a resource.

“I want the shop to be an active hub where people can network,” said the former Ben Davis and Park Tudor high school teacher. She plans on launching sewing classes, as well as a sewing group.

Her modern quilts will also be on sale, and the shop will also serve as her workshop. And she has been busy, spending the last year in Minnesota producing a wide variety of sewn items, such as her “Harriet Headbands” line which can be found at retailers such as Silver in the City and Invoke Yoga. Those items will continue to be featured only at those local retailers, as well as about a dozen other retailers in Indiana, Wisconsin and Minnesota.

All that Northland industriousness left Givans with a fair amount of fabric, which started her thinking about Downtown’s need for a fabric store for contemporary crafters. “I am so incredibly excited to be on the Avenue,” she said. “I really feel at home when I’m on Mass Ave.”

She plans a quiet opening on Aug. 1 for Crimson Tate Modern Quilts, with a more substantial grand opening in mid-September after her full inventory arrives. The shop will be open 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays.

Hope (left) and Faith Felder have redesigned the former Walnut Street machine shop into a store that makes it “feel like you are going into a home.”

What to do? That question faced her mother, as well. Faith Felder had spent the last several years as a stay-at-home mom, but with Hope’s younger brother set to graduate from high school, the empty-nester time was nigh.

And so mother and daughter teamed up to renovate some houses, but wanted something else. Turns out that something else was sitting at 517 E. Walnut St. just off Mass Ave. The two-story commercial building last used by the Ray & Schmacher machine shop, the two Felders believed, was a fitting place to open a furniture store which they would name Chatham Home.

“We want it to feel like you are going into a home,” Hope said while talking about the wide range of styles the new store will feature when it opens on Friday, Aug. 5. The new store, she said, will reflect the idea that most people decorate their home in an eclectic manner. “They don’t pick a style,” she said. “They pick pieces they like and then make it work.” Part of the fun, Hope said, “is matching different pieces together that you wouldn’t think go together.”

Both levels of Chatham Home will feature vignettes, complete with home accessories and gifts which are more than a small part of the inventory. Upholstery, rugs and lighting will also be featured.

Furniture will range from antiques to contemporary – including solid-wood new products such as the American Leather brand. Chatham Home will also feature furniture made from “reclaimed” teak from India.

The centerpiece, however, won’t be for sale at all. It’s a four-ton die-stamping machine which was once part of the Ray & Schumaker enterprise. It has a name: “Bob’s Big Boy,” a reference to Bob Schumaker, who worked in the business until about six months ago and whose grandfather started the Ideal Tool & Die company  in 1937. Bob Schumaker had employees until about six years ago, when he decided to slow down, handling only select customers on his own. About six months ago, he retired.

Customers will also find other leftovers from the machine shop tucked throughout the 6,000 square feet of display space. The Felders have ideas about turning some tools into lamps or handrails. “Industrial chic,” they said. “We want to celebrate the building’s history,” Faith said. As they approached opening day, they also hoped to be able to place some historic photos from the neighborhood on the walls.

According to the Chatham Arch-Massachusetts Avenue Historic Preservation Plan, the building dates to 1910. Before construction was completed, its original owner sold it to James F. White, founder of the White Furniture Stores – but that’s probably the extent of its prior connection to furniture. White rented half the building to the Silent Evangelical Society, distributors of Bibles and other religious memorabilia. The society remained until 1921. William M. Eastman and Claude J. Mick rented the other half in 1914. Their firm, Leader Specialty Co., used the building until 1931 to sell plumbing supplies.

Bob Schumaker said his grandfather bought the building in 1937. The house which is now attached to it was moved from the corner of Walnut Street and Mass Ave, to be replaced by a larger commercial building which was later destroyed by fire (and eventually replaced by the modern home of Dean Johnson Design). The house is not part of the sale to the Felders.

The furniture store space is framed by partly plaster-covered brick walls to which the Felders did very little work. The drywall creating the display vignettes, however, will be counterpoint. “It will be bright and colorful,” Hope promised, reflecting her own tastes.

Chatham Home will be open Tuesdays through Sundays. At press time, the mother and daughter were still debating the hours, likely to be 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., with later closing times on Fridays and Saturdays.

Faith and Hope – who will comprise the entire sales staff as well – don’t believe only customers should walk through their front door of their family-owned enterprise. “We want people to come in and enjoy just being in here,” Faith said. “We see it as a destination.”