Two Tacoma Restaurant Veterans Are Creating McKinley’s Next Neighborhood Haunt

The corner of McKinley Avenue that served breakfast, drinks and neighborhood conversation for years is preparing for its next act—and this time, it will have two names.

Chef Craig Tronset and bar professional Kylie Agostini are creating Maxine’s and The Well inside the former Fergie’s on the Ave at 3504 McKinley Avenue. One side will become a modern diner; the other will operate as a neighborhood tavern with an entirely different atmosphere.

The partners received the keys near the end of August and quickly began removing old carpeting, sorting through leftover decorations and discovering some wonderfully strange artifacts hidden around the building.

Their finds reportedly included ceramic clowns, a boxed animatronic singing lobster, a natural-childbirth paperback and a banner from Lulu’s Restaurant & Lounge, which occupied the space before Fergie’s.

Those discoveries reflect just how many lives the building has already lived.

Constructed in 1919, the corner once housed a Piggly Wiggly grocery store. Tacoma Public Library records indicate that a shoe store, men’s clothing business and barbershop also operated there. Lulu’s occupied the restaurant space during the 1980s, followed years later by Fergie’s, which served the neighborhood for approximately 16 years.

Tronset and Agostini do not intend to erase that history. They want to preserve the building’s identity as an approachable place where neighbors can eat, drink and spend time together—while updating what appears on the plates and behind the bar.

Maxine’s will be the lighter and brighter half of the operation. Tronset describes the concept as an elevated diner without the stiffness sometimes associated with upscale restaurants.

Its developing menu is expected to include sandwiches, shareable small and medium plates, house-seasoned tavern snacks and rotating specials driven by seasonal ingredients. Homemade crumpets and a contemporary version of the traditional British dish toad in the hole are among the brunch ideas being considered.

Tronset previously led the kitchen at Corbeau and worked at Tacoma’s The Table, as well as Seattle restaurants including Bastille. His cooking emphasizes carefully sourced ingredients and menus that change with the seasons.

The Well will offer the building’s darker, moodier personality.

Agostini has worked at cocktail-focused Tacoma establishments including Tacoma Cabana and Hilltop Kitchen and most recently managed Corbeau’s bar program. She envisions a tavern capable of serving an inventive craft cocktail without making a customer feel out of place for ordering a simple beer and shot.

The contrasting interiors will help separate the two experiences. Early plans call for plants, eclectic objects and touches of taxidermy, with Maxine’s leaning bright and inviting while The Well becomes darker and more intimate.

The owners also want prices to remain accessible enough for the businesses to become regular neighborhood gathering places rather than special-occasion destinations.

That balance—creative but comfortable, polished but affordable—was central to their search for a location. They wanted an existing restaurant in a Tacoma neighborhood that did not already have an abundance of modern dining rooms and cocktail bars.

Fergie’s offered the commercial kitchen they needed, an established neighborhood identity and nearly a century of stories embedded in the walls.

The partners are aiming for a late-2026 opening, although the age of the building could complicate that timeline. Electrical and plumbing improvements may be necessary before the two businesses can welcome customers.

When the doors finally open, McKinley Hill will not simply be getting another restaurant. It will be getting two distinct gathering places—both built inside a space that Tacoma neighbors already know.

Follow Maxine’s and The Well on Instagram for progress and opening updates here.