GIA partners for downtown project

Graham Industrial Association and the Hayhurst Brothers, featured on the DIY Network program ‘Texas Flip N Move,’ have partnered for a building concept on 509 and 511 4th Street to help revitalize the downtown square.

The Hayhurst Brothers are made up of brothers Jake, Seth and Daniel, who work from their office in Bridgeport.

“We design and build residential homes as well as commercial spaces,” Seth said. “(...) One the things that we are real passionate about is vertical integration in our business, so instead of just designing the home and building the home and then handing off a bunch of other stuff to trades to do, we try to keep to keep as much of it in-house as possible so that we maintain quality control. So we do our own custom cabinetry, we do our own custom furniture, we do metal work and all kinds of stuff like that.”

The trio has worked and completed projects in Decatur, Argyle, Denton and Bridgeport with the goal of revitalization in mind. Their goal is to bring life to the square and bring the heart back to towns.

“The generation I lived in the 90s, we went downtown and it was a ghost town, but there is so much character and so much potential and just so much beauty within these buildings and I think that the next generation is realizing that and kind of what is old is new and they are really passionate and wanting to just be a part of these old downtowns and there is just unbelievable potential, especially here in Graham,” Jake said. “It is so large and there are so many cool buildings (like the) radio stations, the movie theaters and all of the green space, it is a cool project for us.”

The planning for the project is in the early stages, but Graham Industrial Association Executive Director Joe Beruta said it will be a mix of food and retail areas serving as an incubator for businesses to try a concept and then move onto the square once it takes off.

“I love the idea of this incubator stage of a lot of these passionate people that want to start a business or have ideas, but they can’t afford to open a whole big new shop, the concept of them being able to come into a small space and be creative and express themselves and hopefully from there they prove their concept and people love and then get to take their concept and put it into one of the great buildings downtown and then it just kind of cycles through,” Jake said.

Beruta said some of the vendors from the Food Truck Championship of Graham were looking for a space where they could test their food truck concept at a physical location. He said this new space would offer those trucks the opportunity to expand.

“A lot of those folks are chefs that have aspirations for physical presence, so we can maybe provide that to them at a lower cost than normally having to either buy a building or lease and building and build out a professional kitchen to their needs,” Beruta said. “They will have this opportunity to maybe go in at a lower cost, build a book of business and then eventually migrate out once they are successful into the square somewhere to have a more permanent location.”

The project is also meant to be a family location where they can come and watch a sporting event indoors, outdoors or on the rooftop terrace, Jake said. The brothers, along with the GIA, are looking to expand business to the square with the property.

“I think the goal of the Graham Industrial Association is to use this property as a tent pole, if you will, to bring together community and culture, bring more activity and traffic to the restaurants and retail in the square and be the tent pole for revitalization,” Beruta said. “(…)We are excited about this project. We have a long way to go from the final design all the way to putting a shovel in the ground, but it is exciting we are going down this avenue and we have gotten the right design and build team the Hayhurst Brothers and we are excited to partner with them.”

When the brothers built other properties in small towns some of the original business owners were worried their restaurants would be affected by the new one.

“When you create something that has activity it is going to breed activity in the other spaces,” Seth said. “Kind of, all boats rise with the tide is kind of the way we look at it and it has been successful in the places that we have been doing it so far.”

For the rest of the story, see the Wednesday, Oct. 16 edition of The Graham Leader.