"This is really an anchor location on the east side." That's how Richard Griffin, head of the City of Frederick's economic development office, described 340 E. Patrick St. when The Elk's Haven opened there this summer. He gave the reason in the next breath. A new hotel and conference center is going up about a block away, and its guests will need places to eat and things to do.
That hotel, the Marriott Downtown Frederick at Carroll Creek, is set to be finished in 2027. The businesses expecting its guests are opening now. That puts the stretch where East Patrick Street meets South Carroll Street in an unusual spot this fall. Taprooms, a distillery patio and a food hall in progress are being built for a visitor crowd that hasn't checked in yet, which leaves a gap of a year or more when the people using them are mostly the ones who already live here.
The building that sat empty for three decades
The Elk's Haven is a wine-and-beer taproom and restaurant run by Julian and Bridget Wilson, who own Elk Run Vineyards near Mount Airy. They pour Elk Run wines and beers from Frederick's Prospect Point Brewing. The grand opening was July 29, 2026. The Wilsons had been looking for a downtown spot since 2023, and the search got serious in the last months of 2025.
The space has a longer history than the business. Idiom Brewing Company spent seven years there before closing in February. Before Idiom, Griffin said, the brick industrial building had been vacant for about 30 years. The city cares about this corner because the building faces both East Patrick Street and the creek, and the Elk's Haven patio sits right on Carroll Creek. When the space emptied out in February, the east end lost its anchor. It took the Wilsons about six months to fill it.
The Elk's Haven isn't alone in the building. Steinhardt Brewing Company, a small family brewery and tasting room, has Suites 100 to 102 at the same address, and The Elk's Haven is in Suite 104. Melissa Aellen, president of the Maryland Wineries Association, told the Frederick News-Post that a craft beverage area needs a variety of businesses to become a destination. One building now holds a brewery and a winery's taproom, and a distillery sits a short walk down the creek.
Kara Norman, executive director of the Downtown Frederick Partnership, has already pictured The Elk's Haven hosting wedding rehearsal dinners for hotel guests. For now, the calendar is full of weeknight game nights and themed parties, the kind of programming a neighborhood bar uses to build regulars.
A food hall waiting on its neighbor across the street
Walk west along the creek and you reach McClintock Distilling at 35 S. Carroll St. It already has a tasting room. The bigger project is downstairs, where the owners are turning the lower level of their historic building into a food hall-style dining space. As of early September, co-owner Braeden Bumpers said it was on track to open by the end of the year.
The plan calls for two permanent stalls, a rotating pop-up space, and a market for local meats, cheeses and other farm products from Frederick County. The owners are still choosing partners for the two anchor stalls, and they want cuisines Frederick doesn't already have. The renovation hasn't been easy. Crews found wooden pipes, and water from Patrick Street was draining into the building. The building was once the service center and paint shop for a car dealership in the early 1900s. One part is already done. A new patio now serves both the future food hall and the current tasting room.
Bumpers explained the hotel connection plainly. Many tasting room customers are tourists, and many of them stay at hotels outside downtown. The new hotel and conference center going up across South Carroll Street will have more than 200 rooms. Pete Plamondon, co-president of Plamondon Hospitality Partners, the hotel's developer, said in an email that he expects the McClintock expansion to make the area around the hotel more attractive to guests. Each project is counting on the other to bring people in. If the food hall opens on schedule, it will be serving before the hotel next door is done.
Where each piece stands in early October 2026
| Project | Location | Status | Stated target |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Elk's Haven | 340 E. Patrick St., Suite 104 | Open since July 29 grand opening | Open |
| Steinhardt Brewing Company | 340 E. Patrick St., Suites 100 to 102 | Open, with events scheduled | Open |
| McClintock food hall | 35 S. Carroll St. | Under construction; patio finished | End of 2026 |
| Marriott Downtown Frederick at Carroll Creek | Across South Carroll from McClintock | Under construction | Completion in 2027 |
| East All Saints and South East Street intersection | Near the transit center | Scheduled start Sept. 14 | End of 2027 |
| Frederick Brickworks | East and South streets | Anchor tenant named | First phase in 2028 |
The hotel's most recent public progress update is a video posted June 9, 2026. The 2027 date is a completion target, and no opening day has been announced.
October and beyond, around East Patrick
The east end's fall calendar is already busy without a single hotel guest.
- Fridays through Oct. 30, 5 to 9 p.m.: Board Game Night at The Elk's Haven.
- Thursday, Oct. 8: Live music at Tenth Ward Distilling Company, 55 E. Patrick St.
- Saturday, Oct. 10: Queeraoke at Tenth Ward, which repeats on the second Saturday of each month, Nov. 14 and Dec. 12, through Jan. 9, 2027.
- Saturday, Oct. 17, 6 to 11 p.m.: Hogwarts at the Haven, at The Elk's Haven.
- Sunday, Oct. 25, noon to 5:30 p.m.: Drag Bingo: Ghoulish Gallery at Steinhardt Brewing Company.
- Thursdays through Saturdays until Dec. 12, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.: The 2026 exhibits at the Museum of Frederick County History, 24 E. Church St., including one on All Saints Street and Frederick's African American community.
For food before or after, The Banyan at 216 E. Patrick St. serves sandwiches, burgers, wings and salads, which the Downtown Frederick Partnership calls "rooftop favorites." Maxwell's Burgers & Shakes is at 57 E. Patrick St., next to Tenth Ward. Frederick Coffee Co. is a block north at 100 N. East St.
In December, the Downtown Frederick Partnership's holiday page lists the Kris Kringle Procession for Dec. 12, 6:30 to 8 p.m. It starts at the corner of South Carroll and East Patrick streets, a few steps from the hotel site, and ends in Baker Park with the lighting of the City Tree. Some dates on that page may carry over from last year, so check the date again closer to December.
Orange cones at All Saints and East
Getting to the east end will be messier for a while. The City of Frederick scheduled work at the intersection of East All Saints Street and South East Street to start Sept. 14. The project adds a new traffic signal, accessible curb ramps and safety upgrades for transit riders and pedestrians, and it's expected to finish by the end of 2027. Expect periodic lane and sidewalk closures in and around the intersection while work continues.
The new signal will let buses turn left out of the transit center, and the project also realigns the MARC entrance. The Frederick News-Post reported that several county bus routes could cut minutes off their trips as a result. The intersection's target date matches the hotel's completion year, so the street access and the visitors could arrive in the same year.
After the hotel comes Brickworks
The next layer is further out. Frederick Brickworks, a 63-acre development at East and South streets on the edge of downtown, is planned for 700 apartments, 320 townhouses and 100,000 square feet of retail. In August it named Club Studio, a 30,000-square-foot fitness and wellness center, as one of its anchors. The first phase is expected in 2028.
That sets the order of events. The food hall is due at the end of 2026, the hotel and the intersection in 2027, and Brickworks' first phase in 2028. The taprooms at 340 E. Patrick St. are open now, and their October calendar is already set.
If you'd like a broader look at the city, our Frederick neighborhood guide and our earlier piece on downtown Frederick's summer openings follow the North Market Street side of the story.
If you live near East Patrick Street or Carroll Creek and wonder how a hotel, a food hall and a new Brickworks neighborhood could change your block over the next few years, Rosie Tomlinson is happy to talk it through with you, with no pressure. Let's Connect.
