Baltimore Run Club Turns Old Meadworks Taproom Into Johnston Square Café

A Baltimore running club is turning the taproom it once used as a meeting spot into a full-blown community café, taking over the former Charm City Meadworks space on East Biddle Street in the city's Johnston Square neighborhood. Neighborhood Runners, founded seven years ago by Anthony Williams and Tavon Smith, plans to open the café by the end of 2026, with renovations set to begin soon. To help pay for it, the club is hosting its first fundraising Crab Feast next month.

According to WMAR-2 News, the taproom served as a gathering place for Neighborhood Runners for years before the club decided to take over the space itself. The group has grown from a running crew into what the station describes as a community institution larger than a running group, regularly drawing 20 to 40 people to its runs. Co-founder Tavon Smith said the club is putting its stamp on Johnston Square, while Anthony Williams said the café should serve as a community hub where neighbors can start their day, grab a healthy breakfast, and build connections.

A Taproom's Second Life

The Biddle Street building has a history as a beverage-industry gathering spot. Charm City Meadworks, which described itself as Baltimore's first meadery when it launched in Curtis Bay in 2014, expanded into the Johnston Square building in 2017 after outgrowing its original garage space, per SouthBMore.com. The meadery's run at that address ended after a rocky stretch: public court filings reviewed by The Baltimore Sun via Reddit indicate that property owner Travaju LLC obtained a court-ordered eviction warrant in January 2025 following a late-2024 civil lawsuit over unpaid rent. Charm City Meadworks closed its Johnston Square taproom that same month and relocated operations to Peabody Heights Brewery in Baltimore's Abell neighborhood.

Now the WMAR-2 News report notes that community members have already shown up to support the run club's transformation of the space, bringing cases of water and food to help the effort along. Williams told the station that connections made at the upcoming Crab Feast could help sustain the project financially until the café actually opens its doors.

Crab Feast Set For September 26

Neighborhood Runners has invited the community to its inaugural fundraising Crab Feast, scheduled for Saturday, September 26, from 2 p.m. to 6:30 p.m. at 400 East Biddle Street. The event has capacity for 200 people and costs $100 per person for all-you-can-eat crabs, with proceeds going toward the café buildout. Staci Lang, quoted in the same report, said Neighborhood Runners is about community and creating a family where everyone feels included.

Williams and Smith started the club with the goal of encouraging people to stay active, and Williams has said the East Baltimore location should now serve a renewed purpose beyond running meetups. As renovations get underway, the founders are framing the café as the next chapter for a group that has already outgrown its original identity as just a running club.

Part Of A Bigger Johnston Square Push

The café's arrival lands amid a broader wave of investment in Johnston Square, a neighborhood that has faced decades of disinvestment but is now the focus of a structured, community-led revitalization effort. The Baltimore Planning Commission unanimously approved the Johnston Square Vision Plan in March 2020, a $200 million framework to rebuild housing, add parks, and revitalize commercial corridors, according to ReBUILD Metro. Nonprofit developer ReBUILD Metro and community partners have since reduced Johnston Square's vacant home count by 40 percent using a “whole-blocks” redevelopment approach, per Smart Cities Dive.

Other public investments have targeted the immediate area around East Biddle Street. In November 2023, state and local officials celebrated the first four rehabilitated rowhomes on Biddle Street under Maryland's Homeownership Works pilot program, part of a $4 million state effort to restore 25 vacant properties in the neighborhood, according to the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development. ReBUILD Metro's Johnston Square Legacy Homeowner Repair Program, launched in 2023, has funded major deferred home repairs for more than 30 long-time residents as a way to prevent displacement during the wider revitalization push.

Construction also began in 2024 on The Hammond at Greenmount Park, a mixed-income development in Johnston Square that will include 100 affordable apartments and the first new branch of the Enoch Pratt Free Library built in Baltimore in 15 years, according to the Somerset Development Company. Citywide, Baltimore has reduced its total number of vacant properties from 16,431 in 2020 to 13,776 by mid-2026, the lowest municipal vacancy level in decades, according to the Baltimore City Department of Housing and Community Development. Against that backdrop, the Neighborhood Runners' café project represents a grassroots piece of a neighborhood already in the midst of significant change.