A new bar that embodies the old-school Texas ice house is headed for Dallas' Henderson Avenue: Called Lawnie's, it's at 2414 N. Henderson Ave., in a modest house that at one time was home to a barber shop.
UPDATED 9-12-2024: Lawnie's is now open, with an assortment of canned alcohol, basic poured cocktails, and pre-packaged food offerings, as well as original pine floors, large patio, and service-window bars. A true Southern ice house, Lawnie's has no walk-in refrigeration system or draft beer offerings.
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Built in 1924, it's a small, 1,333-square foot abode that makes the perfect setting for the concept: a casual, front-lawn hangout, featuring packaged beer, basic cocktails, and a comfortable setting to sit down and enjoy.
The team behind Lawnie's includes Sam Wynne, a well-known local operator whose prior concepts include Braindead Brewing (now closed), and Mike's Gemini Twin, which he co-founded in the Cedars District with Pasha Heidari (Bowen House, Las Palmas), joined by his business partners Matt Peterson and Devan Pharis, local entrepreneurs and owners of Estacado Interests, as well as lead investor Josh Bishop.
At Lawnie's, the goal is comfort and simplicity, and true to form for a classic ice house, it will be a bar, not a bar-restaurant.
"This will be an ice house style bar, it won't have a kitchen although we will have food offerings, including food trucks," Wynne says.
Their definition of ice house is not the newfangled Austin-style "ice house" bar, but instead the South Texas-born ice house with garage doors and no air conditioning that served only beer.
Southern Livingdescribes it as "an open-air gathering spot with picnic tables, well-worn wooden buildings, bottled and canned beers, and patrons mixing and mingling."
It's a shift for Wynne, whose Braindead Brewing resided at the center of the Great Craft Beer Wave of the 2000s — a beer wave that is still in gear, although bigger and more corporate these days. At Lawnie's, they won't even have beer on tap.
"Beer is a part of me and who I am, so we’ll definitely have some good beer in packaged form, but it’s not going to be boutique beers," Wynne says. "We'll have about 30 offerings, with a dozen or so of your mainstay beers that you'd find at any bar, and 10 to 15 more adventurous labels."
They'll also have seltzers and mixed beverages including a variety of signature cocktails — "but it's not going to be crazy," he says.
Lawnie's, pre-renovation.Courtesy
Henderson Avenue is currently in transformation, as small homes from the 1920s and 1930s repurposed into businesses such as Beauty Bar are being torn down, to be replaced by newer and bigger. The drive for density is a rising tide. Keeping a vintage building intact is nearly a heroic act.
They're renovating with a goal to preserve the house as much as possible in its original state, including salvaging the brick chimneys and original pine floors.
They'll add two big service-window bars pointing out onto a sprawling patio, which they promise will be the largest outdoor patio on Henderson. You can follow their progress on Instagram at LawniesBar.
"The house is going to stay a house — we're not adding any square footage," he says. "We'll have a bar in the front quarter in what used to be essentially the living room."
The focus will be on the outside, with an abundance of seating. "In the classic ice house style, you barely had an interior, it was all a patio or outdoor space," Wynne says.
"The vibe we’re going for is drinking in your friend’s front yard, sitting outside with a few games, good music, and sports on the TV. Simple."
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