New Plan for Old Fire Station: Cutting-Edge 'Micro-Lounge'

Perhaps the will be the charm for Jason Morales, who has scaled back but not given up plans to open a restaurant/bar in the downtown building that was once the .

The “micro-lounge” concept he now has in mind incorporates some of the cutting-edge features found in the Chicago , such as table-side beer taps that let patrons pour their own brew and small gas roasters embedded in tabletops for grill-it-yourself meals on the outdoor patio.  

Even the décor will have an edge, he said. He’s acquired the glow-in-the-dark bar top, 4-foot-by-8-foot bubble machine and other items from the now-defunct Martini Park, a Chicago lounge he helped design that was named best neighborhood bar by Chicago magazine in 2007.

The one thing the 24108 Lockport St. business won’t have is more than the 1,500 square feet the building currently boasts. Morales has abandoned plans to add a second level or to build out the basement level, the former of which raised concerns for the Plainfield Village Board.

“We’re kind of coming up with a new concept, and bringing a small piece of Chicago to a small place,” he said.

He realized, he said, that most downtowns have small buildings that you’re never going to be able to make larger without ruining the look or the historical integrity. So, the idea is how to “think out of the box” with the space that you have to work with, he said.

One idea he has, for example, is to place the beer kegs in an insulated cooler beneath the floor so they don’t take up huge amounts of bar space. If they’re covered by a Plexiglass and lit, not only will they add an interesting visual element, they’ll also tell patrons what beers are on tap, Morales said.

As for food, he still intends to bring in a consultant from Chicago’s Sunda restaurant, where his brother is one of the chefs, to create a menu of small plates, he said.

While he has the design plans just about finished and he’d like to be open by winter, Morales said he won’t rush the project.

“I’m not in a hurry,” he said. “I’m already stuck with the mortgage. I want to do it right.”

Morales will need village board approval for his plan, but he has decided not to seek the façade grant for which he’d previously applied, he said. In part, it’s because he wants to install a roll-up door that can open in the summer and which will reinforce the building’s appearance as a former firehouse.

Some board members balked at that request previously because they didn’t like using village money on a unique feature that may not fit the building’s next use, should Morales close or sell the restaurant/bar.