New restaurant, craft brewery, bakery and coffee roaster will join other makers in the space and be an asset to tech workers and surrounding neighbourhood

Kitchener, Ontario – January 31, 2017 – The new Catalyst137 technology hub at 137 Glasgow St. will feature a new restaurant and market concept, Graffiti, from the group behind Kitchener’s popular The Berlin restaurant.

This will be the second joint venture for renowned chef Jonathan Gushue and hospitality veteran Ryan Lloyd-Craig. Graffiti will provide a unique environment for Catalyst workers, visitors and the surrounding community. There will be a coffee shop and roaster combined with a bakery near the building entrance. Explore further into the space visitors will find a microbrewery with the capacity to produce over 2,000 barrels per year, a retail food market, and a modern ultra-casual restaurant with a menu focusing on wood-fired pizza and Italian-influenced dishes. Graffiti will serve breakfast, lunch, dinner and late-night. Guests will be able to eat in, take out, or hang out on one of Kitchener-Waterloo’s largest patios, which will overlook the Iron Horse Trail.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Catalyst137,” said Ryan Lloyd-Craig, co-owner of Graffiti. “Graffiti aims to provide exceptional quality and service in a truly casual environment complete with great music, entertainment and the odd LP skipping in the background from time to time. Whether our guests want to join us for a great cup of coffee, bring home dinner and a case of beer, or enjoy a multi-course tasting menu in a private room, we will have everything for them at Graffiti. Our hope is to become a neighborhood institution and a culinary destination all housed in a world-class incubator for future tech and progressive entrepreneurship.”

The name Graffiti was chosen to represent the genre of artistic expression or the abstract nature of the concept, it can be anything and everything. Graffiti will be the only restaurant on site and joins several area tech companies and related service providers.

“From the beginning, our vision for Catalyst137 was to create a one-stop shop featuring space for hardware tech companies and the businesses needed for them to get their products to market,” said Kurtis McBride, CEO of Miovision and co-founder of Catalyst137. “The addition of Graffiti fits perfectly with Catalyst137’s theme as a place for makers. It will be an incredible asset for the people who work at Catalyst137 as well as the surrounding neighbourhood and the entire Waterloo region.”

Catalyst137 is offering area businesses options to join a community of startup peers and will lease office spaces ranging from 3,000 to 50,000 square feet. Companies will have access to loading bays and a shared manufacturing space featuring 3D printers, laser cutters, metalworking equipment and more.

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About Catalyst137
Catalyst137 is scheduled to open in summer 2017 in a former tire warehouse on Glasgow along the Iron Horse Trail. The building is undergoing extensive renovations to convert it to a state-of-the-art workspace. In addition to office space, it will feature hundreds of sensors to make the building and surrounding streetscape hackable so that Catalyst137 can act as both a showcase of the region’s technical ingenuity and a sandbox for new innovation. By allowing Catalyst137 members to experiment with, and add to, the building’s IoT network, the hub will help foster new ideas and support emerging technology.

The idea for Catalyst137 came from frustration. Each year, more than two dozen hardware companies graduate from the incubator programs at the University of Waterloo and Communitech. Until now, requirements for manufacturing space and loading docks relegated hardware companies to the outskirts of Kitchener-Waterloo while software companies needing less space swarmed to the city center. Startups from all over the world are invited to benefit from centralized investment, consulting, manufacturing, engineering, government relations and other services, to be consolidated under one 12-acre roof. www.catalyst-137.com.

About Chef Jonathan Gushue
Chef Jonathan Gushue is the Co-owner and Executive Chef of The Berlin, and soon to be opened Graffiti Market, in Kitchener. With more than two decades of culinary experience, Chef Gushue and his work have been honoured with countless awards including CAA Five Diamond, San Pellegrino Top 100 Restaurants in the World, the Gold Award in the Chef Category from the Ontario Hostelry Institute in 2011, the Pinnacle Award for Canadian Chef of the Year in 2010 and Grand Chef Status in 2008. Off the job, he regularly lends his skills as a volunteer at Bridges in Cambridge and has fundraised for The Kirby House and KidsAbility. http://www.theberlinkw.ca.

Media Contacts:

For Catalyst:
Brad Hem
The Dialog Lab
brad@thedialoglab.com
(281) 543-0669

For Graffiti:
Talvi Kuld
TK Strategic Communications
tk@talvikuld.ca
(416) 917-7323