Indianapolis, IN
Looking for a room in Indianapolis? Stay with Freddy, Jason and Beetlejuice — if you dare
Take a video tour inside this horror-themed Indy Airbnb
Owner Dennis Brackenridge narrates a video tour of his newest Airbnb project. A horror-themed motel attached to a coffeeshop.
Mykal McEldowney/IndyStar
Typically, you don’t want to think about murder when staying at an Airbnb. Those noises you hear at night are just the rumblings of an unfamiliar home. Probably.
But for one unique Fountain Square rental, horror-movie scenarios are part of the appeal.
For more than a year, Dennis Brackenridge has poured his time and money into nailing the details on a property much different than the 100 or so he owns around the city.
“I might have spent $1 million on this place,” Brackenridge said. “I’m at the point in my career where I just want to have fun.”
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For a half-century before Brackenridge purchased the building at 1122 Shelby St., the space was known for true, real horror.
It was a dental office.
“We found people’s teeth still in here when we got the place,” Brackenridge recalled.
He gutted the building with dual goals in mind: A short-term rental home based around classic and modern horror films, and an adjoining café themed around the same.
Black House Café and new Airbnb reach Indy’s horror fans
Black House Café opened last month, with drinks like the Never Sleep Again (an almond-milk horchata and espresso mix) and the Booberry (a banana and blueberry smoothie). Its detailed horror décor — fake newspaper clippings, a Jigsaw doll, a “Gremlins”-themed bathroom complete with a life-sized gremlin prop — quickly became a popular Instagram haunt.
A giant mural featuring the nearby Fountain Square Theatre façade and Brackenridge’s children fleeing Freddy Kreuger points the way to “dreams and coffee.”
But on the other side of the building, subtler and uncanny paintings of Norman Bates and Brackenridge in full Bates Motel bellhop garb welcome prospective guests to the rental space.
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Sleeping among killers like Dracula and Freddy Krueger
The makeshift home features three bedrooms, themed after “Friday the 13th,” “Scream” and “A Nightmare on Elm Street,” and two-and-a-half bathrooms, with “Nightmare Before Christmas,” “Dracula” and an immaculate “Ghostbusters.”
Local muralist Pamela Bliss, who painted the Kurt Vonnegut and Reggie Miller murals, worked on the building’s exterior. Graffiti artist Slice painted the interior, which includes a massive Beetlejuice in snake form along the living room and a perfect Stay Puft Marshmallow Man in the “Ghostbusters” bathroom.
A large wooden and repurposed metal dining room table was made locally, as was a coffin-shaped cabinet. Brackenridge and his team spent months stocking the place with much smaller details, as well: A realistic mask of Beetlejuice’s head, Camp Crystal Lake pillows, a succulent planter shaped like Chucky.
Brackenridge had originally planned to convert the space into some sort of 4-D interactive movie theater but pivoted to the horror themed rental and café. He is also planning a gangster-themed café in Irvington, with Bliss on board to paint a John Dillinger mural.
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The rental will be available for $275 per weekday and $345 per weekend day, with a two-night minimum. It will host a free open house from noon to 3 p.m. on Jan. 20, and reservations officially open on Jan. 22. Brackenridge recommends booking directly through Instagram at @indys_fletcherplace_experience, but it will be available through Airbnb and other services.
Future plans to enhance, expand rental and café
Brackenridge is also working on a rooftop patio for the rental unit, but it won’t be ready for this month’s launch.
Black House Café will also expand its indoor seating area. Manager Mari Ramirez Reyes said she and Brackenridge originally conceived of it as a walk-up space, but the unique look has lent to folks sitting around awhile.
“It has been wild,” Ramirez Reyes said. “People love the theme and the vibe. We didn’t know it would be so popular.”
Brackenridge hopes access to the café and Fountain Square draws like the Hi-Fi will add to his rental’s appeal. But the plan is to lean into the niche horror audience.
“It really breaks up the monotony,” Brackenridge said. “You are definitely not at home.”
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Rory Appleton is the pop culture reporter at IndyStar. Contact him at 317-552-9044 and rappleton@indystar.com, or follow him on Twitter at @RoryEHAppleton.
INDIANAPOLIS — One person is in critical condition following a shooting on Indy’s near east side.
According to the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, around 8:10 p.m., officers were called to the 2000 block of East Washington Street on reports of a person shot.
Upon arrival, police located a 50-year-old man with injuries consistent with a gunshot wound.
He is currently reported to be in extremely critical condition.
No additional information has been made available at the time of this article’s publication.
This is a developing story; check back for updates.
The Indiana Utility Regulatory Commission on June 17 gave AES the nod to raise electricity rates enough to earn an additional $71 million each year, a decision that drew reproof from Indiana lawmakers who called it another blow to cost-burdened consumers.
The approved rate represents less than half of the $192 million increase that AES initially requested. It’s also less than the $91 million increase proposed in an October settlement agreement between AES, the city of Indianapolis and major electricity consumers like Kroger and Walmart.
But the new rate is still significantly more than what the Indiana Office of Utility Consumer Counselor, the state agency representing ratepayers in the case, recommended in September. The OUCC’s proposal would have capped AES’s annual operating revenue at $21 million less than the current level.
The rate increase authorizes AES to earn a total of nearly $2 billion each year, or an estimated $384 million in profit.
The higher base rate comes as a double whammy for Indianapolis-area households, who are already paying more for electricity this summer after AES temporarily raised rates to account for higher-than-anticipated fuel costs during last winter’s storms. The increase also arrives against the backdrop of inflation, which rose to a three-year high last month, and surging gas prices due to the war in Iran.
Gov. Mike Braun wrote in a Wednesday post to X that he was “deeply disappointed” by the IURC’s approval of the rate increase.
“Hoosiers have spent years tightening their belts and making tough financial decisions,” Braun wrote. “It’s time for utility companies to do the same.”
The IURC’s decision also drew fire from the other side of the aisle. In a June 17 news release, five Democrats representing Indianapolis in the state Senate – J.D. Ford, Andrea Hunley, La Keisha Jackson, Fady Qaddoura, and Greg Taylor – chastised Indiana’s Republican supermajority for failing to rein in rising utility costs.
“Hoosiers pay more. Monopoly utilities collect more. And the leaders in the super-majority who promise affordability over and over again show those are just empty words,” the news release said. “Instead, they continue to defend a system that takes more and more out of our paychecks.”
The consumer advocacy group Citizens Action Coalition also slammed the rate increase. Ben Inskeep, CAC’s program director, said the decision left him “less optimistic that this commission is willing to do things differently and to actually hold utilities accountable.”
He said the IURC should have penalized AES for issues that plagued customers after the utility updated its billing system in 2023, including duplicated withdrawals for the same monthly bill.
The rate increase will take effect in two phases, with rates going up in July 2026 and January 2027. AES officials anticipate the hikes “will be less than $5 per month per phase” for a household that uses 1,000 kilowatt hours of electricity per month, according to a Wednesday news release from the utility.
“The IURC’s decision reflects a thorough, transparent process and balances the need for continued investment in the electric system with a focus on customer affordability,” the news release stated.
Under a state law that Braun signed in February, AES cannot ask for another increase to its base rate until January 2030 — though electricity bills could still go up for other reasons, like the fuel adjustment charge hitting consumers this month.
Three members of the five-member IURC signed off on the rate increase: Andy Zay, David Veleta, and David Ziegner. Commissioner Bob Deig dissented. Commissioner Anthony Swinger recused himself from the decision because he worked on the AES rate case for the OUCC before he was appointed to the IURC by Braun in January.
“None of this was taken lightly,” Zay, the IURC’s chair, said at the Wednesday hearing, adding that the commission and its staff had carefully weighed concerns about affordability. The commissioners did not go into further detail at the hearing.
But the commission’s order shows some of the debates that played out during the rate case. One point of contention was AES’s authorized return on equity — that is, how much the utility can earn each year in profits. Other disputes hinged on how AES forecasts its operating expenses.
The OUCC accused AES of including more than 100 “phantom hires,” vacant positions it did not necessarily intend to fill in its calculations. Last year, AES said that the rising costs of vegetation management, or trimming trees around power lines, also drove the need to raise rates. The OUCC recommended keeping vegetation management costs flat.
One factor that’s not driving higher prices? Data centers.
AES does not currently provide service to any data centers and did not include them in its calculations, AES president Brandi Davis-Handy said in testimony before the IURC.
Tilly Robinson is a Pulliam fellow for the Indianapolis Star. She can be reached at tilly.robinson@indystar.com.
Interactive radar | Weather alerts by county
WATCH LIVE COVERAGE
(WRTV) — A tornado watch has been issued through 1 a.m. EDT Thursday for much of Indiana, the National Weather Service’s Storm Prediction Center said.
The watch area covers 47 of Indiana’s 92 counties, and includes Indianapolis and its surrounding counties.
Counties in the watch area are Bartholomew, Blackford, Boone, Brown, Carroll, Cass, Clay, Clinton, Daviess, Decatur, Delaware, Fountain, Grant, Greene, Hamilton, Hancock, Hendricks, Henry, Howard, Huntington, Jackson, Jay, Jennings, Johnson, Knox, Lawrence, Madison, Marion, Martin, Miami, Monroe, Montgomery, Morgan, Owen, Parke, Putnam, Randolph, Rush, Shelby, Sullivan, Tippecanoe, Tipton, Vermillion, Vigo, Wabash, Warren, and White.
WRTV Meteorologist Ryan Morse says Wednesday afternoon’s rain was the first of two rounds coming to the Hoosier state. A line of supercells were expected to form in Illinois and travel into central Indiana.
In neighboring Illinois, dozens of counties are under a tornado watch until 10 p.m. CDT/11 p.m. EST.
All threats of severe weather were on the table: damaging wind, strong tornadoes, large hail, and flooding.
Severe storms should exit Indiana in the early morning hours.
WISH-TV Meteorologist Keith Gibson says people should have multiple ways of getting alerts and have electronic devices fully charged in case they lose power.
The next chance for rain after these storms could be on Saturday.
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