By Christopher Johnson
If there’s one thing that can be said for certain about Clare this time of year, it’s that there’s no shortage of Irish pride as the 51st Irish Festival approaches. Just about everywhere in town is decked out in green. Between now and Monday, it can’t be stopped. It’s self-sustaining, and the community wouldn’t have it any other way.
With the Doherty Hotel hosting guests from all over Michigan and serving as the entertainment hub for some of the festival’s big-ticket events, it’s the obvious genesis point for a week of festive celebration. Many already know though, it’s the downtown area that serves as the true heart and soul of the festival. If the Doherty is the nucleus of Irish Fest, the surrounding businesses are the metabolic energy that keeps the party going.
Take Timeout for example. The place has been practically transformed into an emerald, leprechaun sanctuary. All things Irish have been layered and applied liberally, like tinsel on a Christmas tree, but not nearly as chaotic. Here it is smartly dressed, modern, and classy. With enough shamrocks, leprechauns, and green adornments to make you do a double take, just to remember this is still Michigan and not downtown Dublin itself. Because it has that gravity about it.
Stepping inside is a wondrous assault on the senses, the kind of sensory overload that somehow makes you want to stay planted in your seat once you finally decide where to sit. Whether it’s at the bar, a booth, or a table, every angle inside Timeout offers a different photogenic perspective.
A traveler could wander off the street just to ask for directions and find themselves charmed before they even sit down. One drink becomes two. Two drinks spark a curiosity about the food menu. Now they’re eating. Suddenly, being lost in Clare doesn’t feel so bad anymore. That’s a stranger’s ideal experience. Now imagine that same warmth multiplied across the countless Clare natives who already know the owners and their team by name.
Tim and Kacey Veenkant are both former teachers who, after 25 to 30 years in the classroom, decided to take a risk and invest in a new venture. Quite the pivot, but one that makes sense when you understand the journey. You can tell a lot about a business and its management style just by sitting down and letting your eyes absorb the room and the way it is run.
“It is fun to decorate,” says Kacey. “I love being able to make the entire restaurant transform into something for all of the customers to enjoy. We love seeing customers come in and seeing how excited they get to see all of the fun things we have put up.”
Some of those decorations include suspended leprechauns that hang over the bar, LED shamrocks that crown each booth, thoughtfully arranged window stickers, and seemingly miles of green garland that weave and arc around the rooms. One exceptional stroke of ingenuity is the door decals of leprechauns seated on toilets, which adorn the restroom doors. Listing everything would be an impossibility. You just have to visit the Tavern and appreciate it yourself.
“It is quite a process,” Kacey continues. “We spend about two weeks getting everything around and up. Not only do Tim and I love doing it, but our entire staff loves being a part of it. They get excited to help and love coming to us with fun ideas. Our customers even pitch in. We actually have two wreaths that customers made for us to put up.”
“The more you give people a good feeling,” Tim adds, “the more they give back.”
That generosity flows straight into the kitchen as well. On the day they started decorating, Carson—their cook—emerged from the back with an idea for a burger: onions grilled down in Guinness, finished under a blanket of swiss cheese on the flat top. Tim and Kacey took one bite and named it on the spot: the March Burger. It didn’t make the festival menu this time around, as Saturday is too relentless for specialty items, but it speaks to the kind of kitchen culture Tim has cultivated, where the cooks aren’t just executing orders. They’re contributing ideas.
The Irish Festival menu leans traditional by design, which is a recurring spread across multiple dining environments in Clare. Corned beef, potatoes, and carrots have been in rotation all week, though this year’s prep brought a quiet remix: a mashed potato bowl topped with corned beef, cabbage, and shredded carrots. “We all tried it yesterday and it was awesome,” Tim says, already planning to make it the standard going forward. “I can’t wait for next year.”
It’s a philosophy that extends well beyond festival week. The burger of the month, the salad of the month, the pizza of the month. It all stems from the same instinct.
“People always want their thing that they always get,” Tim says, “but they always want to try something new.” For him, this isn’t a problem to solve. It’s the whole point.
The same thinking brought live music to Timeout Tavern.
Typically, Clare isn’t overflowing with venues where you can catch a live act. While a DJ or a jukebox comes easy, the ambience of actual musicians playing in the room is something Tim has long desired. He recognized the gap and moved toward it. The response has been enough to expand the schedule this year, and if the pattern holds, it won’t be the last thing at Timeout that started as an experiment and became a regular fixture.
For Tim and Kacey, Timeout Tavern has always been about more than the holiday.
“I just want people to walk through that door and feel like this is an inviting place,” Tim says. “We try to do that every day, not just on Patty’s Day.”
That philosophy shapes everything about how they run their niche during Irish Festival week. Unlike many of the businesses downtown, Timeout operates on roughly a 50/50 split between food and alcohol, a deliberate choice that sets the tone. The tables stay out, the kitchen stays lively, and the experience stays intact for anyone who wants to sit down and actually eat.
The layout and personality of the bar is thoughtful in a way that feels accidental, until the owner sits with you and explains it. Then you grow to appreciate the atmosphere that much more.
Sit on the bar side and you’re in the thick of it. Drift toward the dining room and the music softens to something that hums pleasantly in the background. “If you really don’t like music in your face,” Tim says, “you can sit out here and barely hear it.”
It’s the kind of place, he adds, that he and his wife actively seek out when they travel: a mom-and-pop establishment with live music and a reason to linger. The fact that he gets to run one himself isn’t lost on him. Tim feels happy and well within his element at Timeout Tavern, a business he deems successful because it allows him to fuse old skills as an educator with exceptional and attentive customer service. Right here at home in Clare County.
A little further up the sidewalk, on the opposite side of the Ideal Theatre from Timeout Tavern, is the iconic Whitehouse Restaurant. Upon approach, the average passerby will be stopped dead to appreciate the incredible window painting that fills the frame.
There’s a leprechaun there, much like other leprechauns painted in other windows around town. But this one has a distinct, stylistic grit about him.
He’s centered atop a great toadstool, grinning like he’s got a twisted secret. One hand raised with a frothy Vernors and the other gripping a burger like a trophy. Around him, a small world has been conjured. Other toadstools are present, along with shamrocks that protrude from rolling green hills. A rainbow arcs toward a pot of gold, with coins that look like they would clink and shift if you tapped the glass. An American flag stakes its claim in one corner, reminding you where you are and offering a subtle nod to the artist responsible, whose signature appears in the opposite corner.
The paintbrush responsible belongs to Joe Palowski, a veteran and tattoo artist who runs Clare’s own Devildog Ink and Paint. Less of a formal commission and more of a festive favor for his close friend and Whitehouse owner Paul Weissend, who couldn’t be more ready for Irish Fest.
“I’m excited,” says Paul. “I know we love to have great weather to bring more people out, and more business for everybody of course, but the town always seems to pull together and make the best of any situation. So, I’m just excited to be busy. Looking forward to seeing old faces and staying motivated. A lot of holiday spirit. It’s been a hard winter.”
Inside, what Whitehouse lacks in sitting space it makes up for where it matters most: at the grill. Paul has been helming a selection of festive dishes that he happily invites the public to come in and try. The Irish stew and smoked corned beef are two such specials this week, and Paul keeps an open mind for creativity when it comes to ideas that suit the holiday, much like his neighbors at Timeout Tavern.
Most notably, Paul has doubled down on his famous Irish eggrolls, which have gone undefeated in the past five Irish Dish competitions in the appetizer category.
“People ask me if I’m going to make them every year,” says Paul with a laugh. “It took me an hour and a half to roll up a hundred of them. It’s a tedious task but I did it. People always give me a hard time because I don’t make enough to serve in the restaurant, so I definitely made enough this time.”
Be sure to pop into the Whitehouse during the festival and see what’s cooking.
Moving to the southern end of town, one can’t ignore Ruckle’s Pier when it comes to this conversation. This is one bar that has always commanded a great deal of respect when it comes to accommodating a sense of home style community. The Buck Pull to name on example.
When it comes to interior decorating, however, nobody applies themselves more to a holiday atmosphere than co-owner, Deanna Young. When you cross the threshold at Ruckle’s this week, brace for an impact. Because it’s quite a wonderland she has created for her patrons.
The ceiling is heavily strung with green lights that produce a truly enchanting aura. It’s the kind of thing that makes you proud to order a drink or something off the menu, just to vibe and appreciate it all a little bit longer. A setting like this, much like Timeout Tavern, only invites the eye to wander further at the countless other details that complement this bar’s truly unique personality.
“I wanted it to look like a street fair,” she explains. “I wanted it to look like you were walking down a street somewhere in Ireland. Like, between the bars.”
To achieve this sensibility, Deanna has evolved her sense of decor heavily this year with the installation of brick across just about every flat, vertical surface the interior can offer. What appears to be stonework at a glance is something far more labor-intensive: layers of fabric, carefully cut, fitted, and fastened by hand until the illusion holds completely. It’s the kind of detail you don’t notice until someone tells you, and then you can’t stop marveling at it. Your brain almost autofills exactly what Deanna wants you to see and feel, until the reality catches up.
The brick aesthetic is something she’s been wanting to realize for years, but certain setbacks stalled her vision. This year, she seems to have arrived at something truly profound. It’s the kind of transformation that spirits away just about anybody who walks through the door.
Combined with the polished wood surfaces and floors, it truly looks classical and medieval. Like something pulled from Tolkien’s Middle-Earth and made accessible to the folk of Clare County, with some modern upscaling of course.
Some of the other decorating choices carry a subtle, personal significance that only the staff knows about. Others are there purely there to engage the public, such as the mischievous leprechaun that keeps moving around the bar. His antics have been on proud display in a different location throughout the week, and it’s been a great conversation starter both within the bar and around town.
The image you see here is only a partial realization of Deanna’s vision. The other half will be realized when a turbulent sea of shoulders becomes packed from door to door this weekend. Then it will truly resemble a street fair in the most literal sense.
Both Jason and Deanna are determined to be well stocked and ready for anything this community throws their way. As they say, Irish Fest is their Super Bowl.
