I love reading about the new businesses that have opened up in the past month. I think it’s so important to support small local businesses but even more I am inspired by these people. Running my own business I know first hand how difficult it is and I get re-energized reading about other people in Portland and their new businesses. So check it out. I’m posting just the North and NE new businesses but to see the rest you can click the link at the bottom!

Kerns, Burnside East
During summers spent with her family in Union County, North Carolina, Portlander Julia Barbee was often regaled with tales of a local eccentric named Frocky Jack Morgan, who was characterized by his suspicion of others, but who was nonetheless considered peaceful and kind. He also chose to wear dresses by, pointing out that Jesus wore one, too, and he carried with him at all times a loaded pistol. The man, Barbee says, mystified and enchanted Union County residents, and his story struck a chord with her, too. After years spent designing women’s clothes and selling them in shops around town, Barbee has opened her own studio-showroom, christening it after the man who who captured her childhood imagination. Frocky Jack Morgan’s sometimes simple, often imaginative, pieces are made with nearly 100 percent recycled materials. With creations inspired by architecture, nature and literature, the former sculptor says “I try to keep the palate simple, so that I don’t have to be driven too much by trend.” She points out that this is perhaps understandable coming from a studio art graduate who used to compose performance pieces comprised of text, live moths, pheromones and perfume. And speaking of perfume, she designs and sells that, too.

Frocky Jack Morgan, 811 E Burnside, Ste. 122, 503.567.2143

Fire on the Mountain

Rose City Park, Beaumont
For several years, Fire On The Mountain has been filling up Portlanders with three things they love: pizza, beer by the pitcher and wings. And now they’re expanding, opening a third location where eaters can continue to enjoy the good things they’ve come to expect. But the new location features some things the others don’t: a full bar, a small brewing operation, and brewmaster Ben Nehrling, formerly of the McMenamins’ brewing family, who just completed his first batches of FOTM pale ale, stout and IPA. Of course, the beer will not be limited to only the northeast store, but will be distributed and tapped at its sister stores, too.

Fire on the Mountain, 3443 NE 57th Ave., 503.894.8973

Interurban owners at North Mississippi Ave Portland Oregon

Interurban Fire

Boise, Historic Mississippi
After a brief setback (a small fire, in fact, which caused minor damage to its second floor dining room), chef John Gorham’s (Toro Bravo, Tasty n Sons) and Dan Hart’s (Prost) Interurban is officially open for business. With a dozen draught beers on tap (13, if you consider a rotating cask brew) and a menu offering well-made comfort food (fish ‘n’ chips, shepherd’s pie, gastropub burgers), this place caters to Portland’s foodie crowd looking to nosh on good eats in a relaxed saloon environment.

Interurban, 4057 N Mississippi Ave., 503.284.6669

Las Primas Peruvian Kitchen

Boise
In 2004, Catalina Acuña left her native city of Lima to settle in Portland where she teamed up with her cousin, Sadie Morrison. The pair spent the next several years working together at the same New Seasons Market, but in the last week of December, they opened the doors to their first-ever enterprise, a kitchen specializing in Peruvian street food. Morrison says the menu features plenty of salads and sandwiches, most of which are heavy on the meat (although there are vegetarian and vegan options), as well as other snacks like wontons, chicken wings and baked empanadas. They also serve churros (topped with a homemade goat’s milk caramel), gelato, fresh juices (including one made from purple corn), rotating draught beers, and traditional cocktails like the Pisco Sour. And if the food and drink aren’t fun enough, they also have games to play like foosball and Sapo, a game in which you try to score points by tossing coins into the mouth of a small toad statue.

Las Primas Peruvian Kitchen, 3971 N Williams Ave., 503.206.5790

Tinctoria 1627 NE Alberta Portland Oregon

Vernon, Alberta Street
After nine years of operating an online storefront and taking their show on the road for trunk shows all over the country, Jill Golden and Samantha Becker, the women behind Tinctoria Designs, have opened their first showroom in Portland inside the Alberta Studios complex in the Alberta Arts District. At the new shop, Golden says shoppers can expect the same locally designed and locally manufactured fashion lines to which they’ve grown accustomed. The women’s tops, pants, skirts and dresses are all made with sustainable materials, like hemp, and, once they’ve been manufactured, are hand-dyed (dyes include indigo and madder root) in their nearby studio.

Tinctoria, 1627 NE Alberta St., 503.810.9232

For the rest of the article go here

by Betsy Ballantyne
betsy@betsyballantyne.com