Ever since Kimberly and Jimmy Gibson met in 2007 as chefs at Moxie, both food and local culture have been integral to their relationship. Together, they opened Hungry Bee Catery in 2011, which will soon be one of the nine businesses headquartered at The Hive and Honey Hill, two multi-experiential event centers opening in Chagrin Falls in early 2026.
For Kimberly, a Chagrin Valley native and the daughter of a beekeeper, the value of farm-fresh goods was always apparent. She grew up working in the restaurant industry, which led her to craft big dishes in the big city at the Culinary Institute of America in New York. But her heart was always in a small neighborhood eatery called Timberfire.
“Timberfire was my first cooking job,” Kimberly says. “I worked the salad station. They wrote my college admission letter to the Culinary Institute of America. When you walked into that restaurant, you immediately felt the owner and the manager's appreciation for you coming in and spending your hard-earned money.”
In 2005, the restaurant at 8258 E. Washington St. succumbed to a devastating fire, and the land remained vacant ever since. It left a hole in both Kimberly and the Chagrin Falls community that couldn’t quickly be rectified. She always sought a way to somehow bring it back.
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The silver lining came nearly a decade later in 2023, when Chagrin Cinemas closed, adjacent to the former site of Timberfire. The Gibsons purchased it shortly after.
A new Timberfire remains the inspiration for the repurposed cinema space. It will sustain tradition with a slight face lift from its former, dark cabin interior.
“We're gonna brighten it up a little bit,” Kimberly says of the design. “We are gonna bring some of the original dishes back, but also bring some new favorites of ours as well.”
But with 66,000 square feet of cinema, the Gibsons realized they could do so much more than one restaurant. Much of the campus will be dedicated to Honey Hill, a standalone 400-guest wedding and banquet venue.
Hungry Bee’s headquarters will join Timberfire at The Hive, connected to Honey Hill. The new catery space will be double the size of its current 1,800-square-foot kitchen on East Washington Street.
Five other storefronts will give makers, artists, chefs and mixologists a space to call home at The Hive.
“This is for them, after all,” Kimberly says. “This is our living love letter to the community that has supported us so much.”
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Timberfire will be accompanied by a beer garden, and a hunting lodge-inspired speakeasy will elevate the neighborhood’s cocktail scene. Goods, a vendor marketplace, will present products from local sellers. Screens and Concessions will maintain the history of Chagrin Cinemas, serving high-end theater snacks like charcuterie and showcasing classic movies, sports games and watch parties. The Woodshed, Jimmy’s personal favorite space, will be dedicated to The Grateful Dead as a music venue for small-scale artists and high school bands.
“If you're going to tinker with something or, you know, honing in on your craft, you're kind of woodshedding — figuring out how to do it yourself through trial and error,” Jimmy relates. “That's the kind of inspiration that we drew.”
The Gibsons will use Timberfire’s aesthetic as a springboard for The Hive and Honey Hill’s rustic elegance, with further influence from a visit to Magnolia in Waco, Texas. The acclaimed community project of Chip and Joanna Gaines features a similar layout of local shops, restaurants and the famous Magnolia Market for home decor.
“They are doing it the right way,” says Kimberly, “something very family-friendly.”
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Family matters for the Gibsons and their three daughters, which is why their venues will meet the needs and interests of children and adults alike — a weekend getaway or an after-school oasis on a Wednesday. While Kimberly and Jimmy remark that The Hive and Honey Hill will fulfill many dreams of their own, they’re doing this out of an understanding of what gathering spaces other families in the community need. These will be a dream come true for them, too.
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