Plainfield's Trolley Barn being repurposed as urban market with restaurants, brewery

PLAINFIELD – One of the largest buildings in downtown Plainfield has been undergoing a transformation the past couple of years.

The Trolley Barn, which opened in 1903, is being converted into The Sanctuary, an urban market by the Minor Threat Restaurant Group, which runs Sovereign across the street and Crusade Burger Bar in Yorkville.

The success of those two places has brought the ownership and management group – Dale Lewis, Rafael Gomez and Jessica Gomez – to a point where they are seeking other artisans to help fill the 12,600-square-foot space along with their own concepts.

“I’ve been chasing this building for years,” Lewis said, standing near the front of the structure, now featuring top-to-bottom windows. “Since 2010, I first started trying to get this building. The guy who owned it originally wanted a lot of money for it.”

Because of the condition of the building, it was too much of a risk for Lewis’ investment group to take a chance on.

“So I abandoned my plan, which was going to be a craft brewery, at that time,” he said.

But Paul Wojcieszak, the current owner, caught the previous owner at an opportune time – when he was willing to come down in price. Wojcieszak, president of Sheffield Safety and Loss Control, made significant improvements to the building, and a portion of it is home to his business.

But Wojcieszak was left with a giant space to rent out. In August 2015, he said he was considering high-end retail tenants. Lewis and Minor Threat had something else in mind.

“When I found out Paul [Wojcieszak] bought it and was trying to find tenants for it, it kind of solved my problem of absorbing the risk of the building [conditions],” he said.

The Sanctuary is planned to open in November or December. It will feature three new Minor Threat creations.

At the front of the building to the right will be Swamp Lilly, an elevated Southern dining experience. In the summer, there will be 30 outdoor seats that go with it.

Also on the right side of the building will be Sugar Skull, a Mexico City street food concept.

At the rear of the building will be Devout Brewing, a small craft brewery that will turn out about 5,000 barrels of beer a year. Lewis noted the brewery is scaled back quite a bit from the original plan of opening a brewpub, but it will have an outdoor deck area.

There are three tenant spaces the group is looking to fill with fellow artisanal brands. They’ve interviewed some people already, but nothing has stood out as a perfect fit. They’re looking for bakers, butchers or coffee makers.

Down the left side of the barn will be a banquet facility that the group will manage. It will host 150 to 200 people per gathering, which could include receptions and business meetings.

To the left of the building on the outside is a patio with fire pits.

The project is inspired by The Source, an artisan food market in an 1880s brick foundry building in Denver.

The new restaurants will stick to what Minor Threat is known for – quality ingredients with no freezer or microwave in the building.

The members of Minor Threat do what makes them happy, and extend the same offer to their staff.

“Most of the people that work for us, we allow them to create,” Rafael said. “We’re all involved and discuss things, but we give a lot of freedom to employees. We have employees that design cocktails and chefs design all the food. We have input, but we want them to be happy creatively.”

Being in the restaurant industry for years, they know the stories of business partnerships going bad – and those stories include some of their own.

But they say a business partnership is a lot like marriage. They needed to feel that they could all get along personally and professionally for the rest of their lives.

“I couldn’t do all this alone – run two restaurants – by myself. No way. But together, we can do some really cool things and feed our kids, man. Live the American dream,” Lewis said.

Minor Threat said the village has been very proactive in moving the project forward, because leadership wants to see the building repurposed the right way.