40 CHARLOTTEMAGAZINE.COM // JULY 2019
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According to Matt Lemere, a
board member of the NoDa
Neighborhood and Business
Association (NBA), the buildings
that house Brown and Tonidandel’s
restaurants along North Davidson
Street were built around 1936. A
few of their previous tenants:HABERDISH was L.P. McCall
Grocery around 1940. In the late
’50s and ’60s, it was Charlotte
Billiard Supply, and was later
used as a storage warehouse for
old coin-operated machinery.CRÊPE CELLAR was a lunch
counter in 1938. By 1963, it was
a used furniture store, then a
flower shop for a few years in
the early ’70s. In 2005, it became
Addie’s Jamaican Cuisine.GROWLERS POURHOUSE was
Harwell’s Food Store in 1939. In
the ’50s, it was a clothing store
called Layton’s Sales Company,
and in the early ’80s, it was
Villa Heights Furniture. By 1993,
Aardvark Gallery had moved in.The church, built in 1952, will func-
tion as the main dining room, and a cra
cocktail bar will occupy a smaller building
out back. “Our main thing is preserving
something as beautiful as this and giving
it a new life,” Brown says. To retain the
church’s character, they’ll keep the walls
raw and re nish the two-toned oors.
The center aisle will remain, but instead
of pews, they’ll have a mix of booths
and wooden dining tables Tonidandel is
building himself.
For two Charlotte transplants (she’s
from Pittsburgh; he’s from Cleve land),
they have a deep commitment to the city’s
dining culture—and they’ve cemented
their place in it.
They opened Crêpe Cellar Kitchen &
Pub in April 2009, at the bottom of the
recession. Banks were laying o employ-
ees by the thousands, and businesses were
closing all over the city. The couple had
recently returned to the United States
a er having backpacked around the
world for eight months. They’d le their
corporate jobs in 2007 to travel through
Europe, and spent long stints in northern
Italy and southern Spain. (They made it to
Seoul, Kyoto, and Osaka, too.)(Left)
Haberdish’s
head chef,
Carman
Spadaro, and
bar manager,
Colleen Hughes;
(below)
renovations to
the space that
will become
the main
dining room at
Supperland.1
FROM STORES TO POURS