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Written by Louis Weisberg, Staff writer
May 19, 2011
Diners are drawn to the campy ambiance of Hamburger Mary’s location in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood. – Photo: Courtesy
Hamburger Mary’s, where large gourmet burgers are served with a hefty side of sass, is headed to Milwaukee.
The Chicago-based restaurant company announced May 5 that a location is opening in the city’s Bay View neighborhood at 2130 S. Kinnickinnic Ave. According to a press release, the site, which was formerly an Omega Burger, “will be fabulously remodeled to make way for the reigning ‘Burger Queen’!”
The company hopes to open the restaurant, whose tagline is “Eat, Drink, and be… MARY!” by the end of the summer.
Gay twins Ashley Wright and Brandon Wright own the company as well as the popular Hamburger Mary’s restaurant in Chicago’s Andersonville neighborhood. The Milwaukee Mary’s, their 10th location, will have a local business partner who’s a resident of Bay View. “She and her partner with their newborn baby boy are becoming part of the Mary’s family,” Ashley Wright said.
While the Milwaukee menu will be similar to Chicago’s, it also will feature some “distinctly local items,” Wright said. “We don’t want to be a chain restaurant. Each one is a little bit unique. Certain burgers are on all the Mary’s menus, but otherwise we offer different things in different cities.”
For instance, the Milwaukee Mary’s will feature beer from Wisconsin craft breweries as well as local specialty foods.
A common food theme at Hamburger Mary’s is oversized portions and an emphasis on “natural fresh ingredients and top-quality meat that comes from humanely treated animals,” Wright said.
Another common theme is camp entertainment.
“It’s just a fun atmosphere. It’s classy kitsch,” Wright said. “We are looking forward to rolling out some really fun entertainment, like ‘Dining with the Divas,’ ‘Mary-Oke,’ and our good-time-for-a-good-cause charity ‘Ham-BINGO Mary’s.’” The Milwaukee Mary’s will be the first to feature a separate entertainment area, where the restaurant will stage “Dining with the Divas.”
“It’s basically a drag show during dinner, so it’s a dinner theater kind of thing,” Wright said. “We’re also going to have a three-season porch called ‘Mary’s Lanai.’”
Ald. Tony Zielinski, 14th District, said he lobbied the owners to choose the location on South Kinnickinnic because he believes it will become a popular destination to anchor the southern end of the trendy retail and entertainment corridor.
“The Becher end of KK has been kind of lagging, and I think this will bring people there,” Zielinski said. “I think it’s really going to add to the revitalization of the street.”
Hamburger Mary’s is one of several new developments slated for the area. A $12 million development at KK and Conway will replace “five old dilapidated, hideous-looking buildings” with 9,000 feet of retail below 70 new residential units, Zielinski said.
South of that development, a new, high-concept movie theater “unlike any ever done before in the country” is being developed by the owner of Wauwatosa’s popular Rosebud Cinema, Zielinksi said, adding that the details are top-secret.
One block west of the new Hamburger Mary’s, Sweet Water Organics is undergoing a $250,000 expansion of its internationally recognized fish farm and urban agricultural facility, which will bring 45 new jobs to the area in the next year, according to Zielinski.
“KK and Bay View are getting stronger all the time,” he said. “The economy is pretty tough right now, but we still have all these great projects moving forward. I’m meeting all kinds of new, creative, original thinkers.”
