A new cafe is settling into the fire-scarred storefront at 1340 Thomas Ave. W. in St. Paul's Frogtown neighborhood, where chef Nicole Pederson-Bates and her husband Andrew Bates are opening Bewick Cafe around Minnesota State Fair time. The couple built out the space themselves with help from friends, including a salvaged butcher-block counter Andrew Bates moved from Chicago to St. Paul.
The space has sat empty since Groundswell, a 17-year neighborhood staple, was damaged by a fire in May 2025 and announced in February that it would not reopen, according to Bring Me The News. The fire caused extensive smoke damage across neighboring storefronts, and community members and adjacent businesses launched GoFundMe campaigns that raised over $7,600 to help displaced Groundswell staff, per a separate Bring Me The News report. Groundswell had opened in the neighborhood in 2009 and was once ranked among Midway's top businesses in Hoodline's own Midway neighborhood guide.
Pederson-Bates found the real estate listing for the space herself, according to reporting by the Minnesota Star Tribune. She told the paper she did not want to open the restaurant alone, so she asked Andrew Bates, whom she later married, to become her business partner. He is the one who suggested the name Bewick, inspired by the Bewick's wren, a small songbird that nests in woodlands and thickets. The name is pronounced like the automobile brand Buick, the cafe's owners clarified in a community Facebook post.
A Chef's Long Road Back to Minnesota
Pederson-Bates grew up around the northern suburbs of Minneapolis and studied at the Art Institutes International Minnesota before working in the mountains, Chicago and New York, according to the same Star Tribune profile. She studied under chef Vincent Françoual at Vincent a Restaurant, where she developed a respect for seasonal, local ingredients and a robust pantry of seasonings. Her resume also includes stints at Gramercy Tavern and Red Rooster in Harlem, where chef Marcus Samuelsson once asked her whether she had heard of spice.
In Chicago, she co-owned and served as executive chef at Found Kitchen & Social House, which opened in 2012, and the rustic steakhouse The Barn, which opened in 2016, per the Chicago Tribune. Between 2018 and 2019 she served as Director of Culinary Arts at Chicago's Center on Halsted, where she directed Silver Fork, a nine-week job readiness and culinary training program for LGBTQ community members and allies, according to a Center on Halsted account. After returning to Minnesota, she and Andrew Bates most recently led culinary work at Food Gallery Catering in Minneapolis, where she served as Culinary & Hospitality Director overseeing seasonal menus for corporate events, weddings and local celebrations, according to the company.
What's on the Menu at Bewick
Bewick Cafe plans to open as a daytime cafe first, with breakfast sandwiches, veggie-abundant small plates and a stocked bakery case, before later adding dinner service and eventually becoming a full-service restaurant by night with farm-to-table, globally inspired dishes. The coffee program will run on Dogwood Coffee Co. beans, and the drink menu is expected to include carajillo, hibiscus paloma and nonalcoholic spritzes alongside beer and wine, with plans for a full bar down the line.
The beverage setup itself is notably ambitious for a neighborhood cafe: an 8-tap draft system split evenly between four coffee taps and four tea taps, offering seasonal rotations of classic and nitro brews, according to Autumnwood Farm, which supplies regional dairy products to the shop. Pederson-Bates told the Star Tribune she has become obsessed with getting soft serve into Bewick Cafe, with plans for classic twist cones and possibly a pistachio magic shell topping.
Liquor License Moves Through City Council
An application for intoxicating liquor licenses for 1340 Thomas Ave. W., doing business as Bewick Café, was placed on the St. Paul City Council's agenda on July 8, according to city council records. Liquor licenses in St. Paul require formal city council approval, and it remains unclear exactly when the cafe will transition into its planned full-service evening restaurant model once that approval process concludes.
The building sits at the intersection of Thomas and Hamline avenues near the border of Hamline-Midway and Frogtown, a dining corridor known for eclectic, independent eateries like On's Thai Kitchen and Fasika Ethiopian Restaurant, as Hoodline noted in an earlier Midway neighborhood dining feature. Bewick's arrival comes amid a rough stretch for independent St. Paul cafes in 2026, following the closures of fire-scarred Groundswell in February, Altera in Highland Park in May, and Swede Hollow Cafe, which shut down after 29 years earlier this month.
