The current home of Garfield’s Kitchen is the Terra Cafe, located at 316 South New Street in Bethlehem PA. 18015. This site was developed from a storefront by Michelle Krier in August 2005 and originally opened as The Wildflower Cafe. It was supported by literally hundreds of local artists who painted wall murals, served food and coffee, cleaned, provided paintings and mixed media artwork for exhibitions, and all the other jobs necessary for day to day operation. In 2009 under the guidance of Loly Reynolds of Community Artists of Bethlehem, a massive tile and glass mural was fashioned on the northern wall of the building. Hundreds of indie bands both regional and national were booked by Michelle every Friday and Saturday evening, as well as unusual acts such as hoop spinners and belly dancers. Wildflower also opened its door for yoga classes, fabric exchanges, civic meetings, and all manner of benefit shows.

Michelle began the Open Mics every Tuesday night almost immediately in 2005, but it was a rag tag event based upon performers volunteering parts of sound equipment and music gear until an entire stage was pieced together. Because of impedance matching problems, I became more and more involved in early 2006 and eventually brought my entire PA system, and Michelle asked me to host the event. By 2007 the Tuesday Open Mic became so popular that many people did not have time to perform, so Michelle asked me to begin a second Open Mic on Monday to handle the overflow. In 2008 I tried to start a jazz based Open Mic on Wednesday, but attendance was limited despite valiant support from Steve Rosati, Bill Keane, and the Lewis & Son Music store in Quakertown. Starting in 2009 the people of Artsquest have requested a group of five acts to be chosen from our regular performers to represent the Open Mic during their Musikfest event. And in 2010 the Open Mic was chosen as the best in the Lehigh Valley by the LVMA.

In late 2010 Michelle made the decision to shift her life work and closed the Wildflower on December 31st. However, Manuel Fresneda and Marcel Bedoya, owner operators of TERRA CAFE in Easton, decided to expand into Bethlehem and purchased the site. After extensive investment in remodeling and operating equipment, they reopened the site as TERRA CAFE Bethlehem in February 2011.

Unfortunately, due to slow coffee sales the owners of TERRA CAFE  decided to close the Bethlehem site and concentrate on their Easton site around Halloween 2011. The venue was reopened as WRAP’D TIGHT sandwich shop around March 2012 and I was requested to again host the Open Mic every Tuesday night by the owner, Heather.