Mentor's Historic Matchworks Building Is Getting A Life

Marc Wertenberger is really embracing the upcycling and vintage movement. 

In October 2015, the Lake County businessman bought the red-brick Mentor Matchworks Building. The 50,000-square-foot structure is believed to be the first factory in the city with parts of it dating back to 1868. “Everybody in Lake County knows the Matchworks Building,” Wertenberger says. 

He wanted a place with historic appeal and name recognition to create a vibrant, trendy spot that would attract maker-style small businesses to complement some of the existing professional offices. 

Wertenberger replaced carpeting in some spots and resurfaced concrete flooring in others. But he wanted to keep the building’s personality intact and left red-brick walls, steel beams and ductwork exposed.

“It has that modern industrial feel,” Wertenberger says. “We’re going for that kind of clientele, and those kind of people are attracted to the building.”  

This spring, industrial jewelry artist Brandon Holschuh and Stella’s Art Gallery — an independent art gallery featuring local artists’ paintings, pottery and sculptures as well as arts and craft classes — set up shop in the space.

“I think they appreciate the historical value of the building,” Wertenberger says. “Brandon’s jewelry kind of meshes with what the building’s got going on.” 

Wertenberger is partnering with former Burntwood Tavern executive chef Ryan Scanlon on Fourk, a casual-meets-inventive restaurant on the building’s ground floor with a menu of tavern classics with a twist, craft beers and cocktails.

Over the past 30 years, five other restaurants have occupied the Fourk space, but it also got the rehab treatment with new wood floors and a stripped down industrial look that matches the building’s blue-collar past.

“Rather than putting [in a] franchise, since Mentor’s full of them, we did something a little different,” Wertenberger says.