Some of Nashville’s most popular fast-casual eateries are setting up shop at a high-profile east side intersection.

Vietnamese restaurant Vui’s Kitchen, popular sandwich spot The Grilled Cheeserie, fast-food joint Hugh Baby’s and taco truck-turned-restaurant Tacos Aurora are among the restaurant tenants planned for the Hunters Station redevelopment at Main and South 10th streets.

The building will also house a marketplace stocked with Nashville-made goods and culinary coworking space Citizen Incubator Kitchens, where about 150 food artisans can use the commercial kitchen.

In an interview with The Tennessean, restaurant developer Fresh Hospitality unveiled its up-to-date plans for the property, including the tenant lineup. The project is slated for a summer completion.

“We’re excited to be able to bring a project to East Nashville and bring some of our favorite offerings there,” said Matt Bodnar, a partner in Fresh Hospitality. “Five Points already has some cool food offerings, but we hope to expand on that and give people in East Nashville something that isn’t currently there.”

Ongoing construction is transforming the former Hunters Custom Automotive campus at 969 and 975 Main St. into a multi-concept restaurant building with shared seating and communal outdoor spaces, like a small-scale food hall. Fresh Hospitality purchased the site in 2016 for $4.2 million, and Hunters Custom Automotive later relocated to 955 E. Trinity Lane.

Fresh Hospitality has a track record of bringing new life and foot traffic to well-known or historic Nashville buildings. For instance, in Germantown, the fast-growing Nashville-based company transformed an old theater building into a 13,000-square-foot hub for restaurants. In Hillsboro Village, Fresh renovated the former Sunset Grill building for several restaurants. The company has projects in 15 states.

Fresh partners with on-trend or buzzworthy restaurant brands and helps those entrepreneurs grow by providing financial and intellectual capital. Its partners include Biscuit Love, Greko Greek Street Food, I Love Juice Bar, Martin’s Bar-B-Que, Hugh Baby’s, Taziki’s, Vui’s Kitchen, The Grilled Cheeserie, Tacos Aurora, 55 South, Citizen Incubator Kitchens and more.

None of the four restaurants or the commissary kitchen slated to open at Hunters Station have other locations in East Nashville. The Citizen Incubator Kitchens space in the basement of the building will be nearly triple the size of the original West Nashville location, which will remain open.

“Fresh and Citizen Kitchens have a lot of things in common; we help small food entrepreneurs,” said Laura Wilson, a longtime Nashville chef who started the commercial kitchen in 2015. “We want to not just give people a space in Citizen Kitchens, but also a place to go after that. Sometimes the best way to lose a client is to their own brick-and-mortar.”

Incubator, marketplace planned

Citizen Incubator Kitchens offers food artisans a low-risk platform to launch their business. The West Nashville kitchen has 80 members, with 200 on the wait list, Wilson said. The 8,000-square-foot kitchen at Hunters Station can accommodate about 150 members, who will pay an hourly rate for kitchen hours and a flat monthly rate for storage space.

Wilson also plans to open a marketplace at Hunters Station, which will serve a breakfast menu with coffee, biscuit sandwiches and local pastries. The retail shop will sell goods made mostly by Citizen Incubator Kitchens’ members, including fresh breads and pastries from Village Bakery & Provisions.

For Tacos Aurora owner and former Citizen Kitchens member, Arthur Orr, Hunters Station marks his first expansion into brick-and-mortar from a food truck. The California transplant launched his Mexican street food truck in Clarksville after he was stationed at Fort Campbell.

Orr, who described his food as traditional Mexican with a California influence, said the menu will include tacos, burritos, quesadillas and Borracho Fries topped with meat, cheese, guacamole and sour cream. The drinks menu will feature imported Mexican beers; slushy margaritas, piña coladas and strawberry daiquiris; and homemade aguas frescas.

“I think (Hunters Station) is going to be a super cool, local hangout,” Orr said. “I think East Nashville has the culture and diversity for it to be a really good location for us.”

As East Nashville residents, Joseph Bogan and Crystal De Luna-Bogan have long dreamed of opening The Grilled Cheeserie on their side of the Cumberland River. The Hunters Station location will be their third brick-and-mortar after their Hillsboro Village outpost opened in 2017 and upcoming downtown Franklin location, which is slated to open later this spring.

The Bogans also plan to open their own commissary kitchen at Hunters Station to service their restaurants and food truck.

Joseph Bogan is leading a sustainability effort at Hunters Station, where the restaurants will use mostly compostable packaging and glass instead of plastic. The building will have a large recycling program and a composting program through The Compost Company.

“It has been a cool process,” Joseph Bogan said. “I was really happy to hear the response and see that everybody was on board.”

Reach Lizzy Alfs at lalfs@tennessean.com or 615-726-5948 and on Twitter @lizzyalfs.