Michael Leung and Josh Michnik want the community to decide what kind of business will open in a vacant space on Union Street between Main and Gore.
Leung, who owns the 600-square-foot commercial space, and Michnik, who is the co-owner of a fashion boutique nearby, are polling the community and potential patrons through their This Space project.
They launched their polling website Sept. 19 and received more than 200 responses by Sept. 26, when a restaurant was in the lead with 41 per cent of the votes. The other choices are retail, local service or other.
Leung said This Space will progress to the next question once they have received 1,000 responses.
Michnik, who opened the fashion boutique Charlie and Lee in the neighbouring V6A condo development in April, wanted to have some control over what opened in Leung's commercial space, which is on the ground floor of a B.C. Housing building at 243 Union St.
He spent a week trying to devise the perfect business idea to pitch to Leung, who is a friend of a friend. But he couldn't think of anything that really resonated.
Then his fiancée and business partner Kleah Graham came up with an idea.
She wished there was a way they could ask members of the community what they wanted, and the community-driven forprofit business project was born.
Leung returned home to Vancouver after doing development work for a non-profit in Afghanistan and bought two properties on Union as an investment. The space at the centre of their project was vacated by a barbershop this summer.
Leung welcomed Michnik's suggestion.
"It's a pretty innovative idea and we're getting a lot of feedback to that effect, not only from Vancouver, but also from other cities," Leung said. "At the end of the day, we're just trying to start a small business with private money but to have community input."
Leung, 38, will bankroll the start of the business, which must be an enterprise he deems viable. He has never run a business and possesses no expertise in the restaurant industry.
"It'll be a lot of firsts," he said. The 200-block of Union Street is home to the Jimi Hendrix Shrine, Hogan's Alley Cafe, a few boutiques, an insurance company, a rollerblade shop and a bike shop.
Michnik and Leung are open to suggestions from local residents as well as those who would be destination patrons, like the foodies who flock to the nearby Campagnolo and Bao Bei restaurants.
Leung hopes to open for business in February, employ local residents and support community gardens, park restorations or homeless shelters with a portion of the venture's proceeds.
Michnik, whose background is in art direction and design for commercials and film, says thinking about a business project in-spired by the community has changed him.
"I was more about making things look good and pretty-that was my main focus," the 28-yearold said. "But since working on this project and seeing how you can engage a community to do something like this, and building something that's sustainable is really interesting. I will probably be going more into this kind of work, a little more than branding a restaurant to make it look good."
For more information, see thisspace.ca.
crossi@vancourier.com Twitter: @Cheryl_Rossi
