This Spring in Chicago
Face of the ’hood
Bridgeport, Illinois Ed Marszewski, 47
Manager, Maria’s Packaged Goods & Community Bar
If you took everything that’s fringe, hip and hard-working about Chicago and smushed it together, it might look something like Ed Marszewski. The half-Polish, half-Korean Bridgeport entrepreneur manages Maria’s Packaged Goods & Community Bar with his brother, Dan, and his mother, the bar’s namesake.
He also owns Co-Prosperity Sphere, an art gallery that houses his low- frequency radio station, Lumpen Radio. In 2014, he opened a brewing company, Marz Community, set to expand this year. In addition, he’s heading up an expansion of Maria’s that will be accompanied next door by a Polish-Korean fusion food joint, Kimski. “It’s all an accident that anything is happening in Bridgeport,” he says, noting the changes the neighborhood has undergone over the last decade, particularly through the influx of artists who have flocked there.
Marszewski isn’t worried that the many new faces will diminish the charm of the old ’hood, though. He expects the next decade to bring Bridgeport residents better amenities and jobs and higher incomes, generating money that people will spend locally. And, ever a dreamer, he hopes it might even bring what he calls the BridgeCot Center, a “giant Dymaxion dome that hovers 60 feet in the air above the neighborhood.” —Clayton Guse
For an extended
interview and video, visit
timeout.com/ chicago
“I speak to the rats. The rats understand me.
Why’s that so hard for you to understand?”
“If the Cubs win the
WORD ON THE STREET
Tweet us @timeoutchicago with the hashtag #wordonthestreet. For more things we’ve overheard, go to
timeout.com/chicago
World Series this year, I’m going to finally get that cyst removed.”
“I haven’t eaten a
vegetable in weeks, and I have alopecia.”
4
TIMEOUT.COM/CHICAGO March–May 2016
“Bruce Rauner’s face is so punchable that even Gandhi wouldn’t be able to keep himself from throwing a right hook at him.”
“Aw, man. They
already picked up the trash, and I know your
neighbors were throwing away pornos.”
“Imagine waking up from a coma and learning about Ventra.”
“Hillary Clinton and John Wayne Gacy were born in the same hospital. Think about it.”
“Kissyface is eight years old, covered in Cheetos and is hands down the best kisser in town.”
PHOTOGRAPH: JACLYN RIVAS
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