A family with a long history in the city's hospitality industry is turning a tired corner store property along the busy Shelbourne corridor into a smart neighbourhood bistro.
Brothers Adam and Michael Helm along with partner Cole Byers have spent months gutting and remodelling the former Tan's Market on Shelbourne Street at McRae Aveune.
They plan to open McRae's -- serving West Coast pub-style fare with local beers and wines -- sometime in the next week.
"We get tons of people stopping by asking what we're doing, when we're going to open," said Adam Helm. "We think it's a great spot and something that's really needed here."
The partners say McRae's fills a void along one of the region's busiest thoroughfares, catering not only to the neighbourhoods between Hillside mall and Shelbourne Plaza, but to students at nearby Camosun College as well as the University of Victoria.
The Helm family are no strangers to the area -- or the industry. Their father, Lyndon Helm, built Maude Hunter's Pub further up Shelbourne and later Christie's Carriage House in the Jubilee neighbourhood, where both Adam and Michael cut their teeth in the business washing dishes. Their grandfather, Albert Eudoris Helm, was the founder of the enduring Helm's Inn at the gate to Beacon Hill Park.
All three businesses remain going concerns -- some would say institutions, although the family has divested its interests. Lyndon also founded Saanich Rentals, carving off some of the property to build Maude Hunter's in 1982.
The Helms were also raised just up the street on the slope of Mount Tolmie, where the family has lived for 39 years.
"I am very proud of what the boys are doing," said Lyndon. "This is their project, their idea and I think it's a good one. They worked their up at Christie's, went and did their own things for a while and have come back full circle to do what they really know and love."
The move to food and beverage was a natural shift for the brothers. Adam, 32, and Michael, 27, had operated a u-brew business on Interurban, taking Brew Works out of receivership in 2007 and turning a profit within a few months. They sold it recently to qualify for a food primary liquor licence at McRae's, which is expected to be approved in the coming days.
They've had their eye on the property for years, and grabbed the lease when a plant nursery and cafe ended a brief stint at the site late last year.
Byers, a towering former professional hockey player and friend of the Helms, joined them as a partner after surveying the site.
"I came over here one night about midnight and just walked around and thought 'this is perfect,'" said Byers, 27, a Nipawin, Sask., native who played with the Notre Dame Hounds and Mooose Jaw Warriors before embarking on a six-year pro career -- mostly in Europe. He retired after a season with the Victoria Salmon Kings and is the cousin of long-time Boston Bruins tough guy Lyndon Byers and has a younger brother, Dane, in the New York Rangers organization.
Byers said McRae's will be comfortable spot when people can get an all-day breakfast or linger over a coffee in front of two fireplaces, grab a quick lunch or spend an evening with friends over tacos and a beer. It's casual, comfortable, a place for the neighbourhood to meet, relax and have some fun, he said.
Chef Douglas Morrissey, an old hand in the kitchen who worked with Lyndon Helm for nine years at Christie's, said curious neighbours have already put in menu requests.
"One lady wanted real turkey, not the pressed kind, and I said I can do that," he said. Some of the initial menu items will include breakfast burritos, burgers, tacos as well as a revolving selection of soups, salads and sandwiches.
Morrissey said McRae's fills a gap left by Cecconi's, a popular restaurant that is now a private liquor store a block away at North Dairy and Shelbourne.
There is seating for 50 inside in booths and tables and along the bar, and another 20 on a fenced patio slab facing Shelbourne.
The partners say McRae's will be open from 10 a.m. to midnight.
The reconstruction of the old building, thought to be built in the 1950s and going through various cornerstore names like Pringle's, Lowe's and Tan's, was a challenge. It's actually an old house with a commercial addition -- all under a vaulted roof. Concrete floors had to be lifted and plumbing for three bathrooms and a commercial kitchen had to be installed. The interior is outfitted with fir and cedar cut on a portable mill in Metchosin. A feature wall is done with outside log slabs and the 20-feet fir bar is made from three-inch-thick centre cuts.
A parking lot freshly paved and painted has room for 25 vehicles and several bike racks ring the quarter-acre property.
The Helms say they've spent "a few hundred thousand" dollars in leasehold improvements.
Michael Helm said he hopes McRae's will draw students from Camosun's Lansdowne campus who "only have a cafeteria" when it comes to grabbing some food or drink. He also sees McRae's as a place that keeps residents closer to home and out of their cars.
"They don't always have to go downtown or drive somewhere if they want something to eat and drink," he said. "We really loaded up on the bike racks, too."
Residents seem to agree. McRae's immediate neighbour on Shelbourne, 87-year-old Phyliss Duddridge, has given her full support to the new enterprise -- even asking if she could pay to paint the fence that divides their properties. The partners did it themselves, so she brought them a case of beer while they worked.
""I think it's really exciting to see what they've done," said Duddridge, who has lived in her home for 45 years and raised her family there. "The boys have kept it so neat and tidy and they have been very polite. I'm pulling for them. I don't know of one person who's said anything bad about it. It's a great improvement."
dkloster@tc.canwest.com
