I was born in St Louis, Missouri, technically in a place called Chesterfield – which I always find funny now, having ended up in this Chesterfield-adjacent part of the world. I moved around a lot growing up: Philadelphia, Los Angeles for university, back to Philly, then New York, Brooklyn specifically. Somewhere in there I spent a year in Fort Lauderdale. My parents are now in Seattle and my sister lives near San Francisco – so I’ve seen a lot of the States.
I met my wife, Claire, at two in the morning in a bar in Manhattan. I was in New York playing a gig, and afterwards a friend dragged us to Greenwich Village because bars stayed open until 4am. We walked into this completely empty place, went upstairs and there were four women. One of them is now my wife. So, that was that.
Claire’s from Sheffield. Her dad came here for university, fell in love with the place and never left. So when we were together, we’d come back regularly to visit him, and I just immediately liked Sheffield – from the very first visit.
I’m American, so there’s already a natural fascination with UK culture baked in. But I was also a beer writer, a bar guy, and I fell in love with cask ale and British pubs straight away. People always go on about the Peak District, but honestly – fuck the Peak District, man. I’m scared of heights for starters. Just take me to another good pub. Kelham Island Tavern, The Rising Sun on Fulwood Road, places like that. That was how I fell for this place.
I’d been a beer journalist before I was a bar owner. I even convinced a US publication to print the full cask list from The Rising Sun. Being here at a time when things like Thornbridge’s Kipling were setting the standard for cask was huge for my education: it genuinely shaped how I think about beer. I’d been visiting Sheffield since around 2008, so by the time we moved here it didn’t feel totally alien.
We had a choice: New York to London, or New York to Sheffield. Our son was just two months old, and Sheffield felt like somewhere you could raise a family. It’s hard to separate becoming a parent from moving cities – they happened at the same time – but Sheffield felt manageable in a way New York simply didn’t anymore.
People always go on about the Peak District, but honestly – fuck the Peak District, man… just take me to another good pub.
However, there are similarities people don’t always see. Brooklyn is very neighbourhood-based, very post-industrial. Kelham Island isn’t aesthetically that different from parts of Williamsburg. You can easily walk between places. Areas have their own distinct identity. Sheffield terraces sometimes remind me of the Philadelphia row houses I grew up with.
I’ve been here nine years now. I’m a dual citizen, which I love, and I’ve seen the city change massively in that time. Kelham Island used to be surrounded by empty lots and wasteland. When we opened The Old Shoe, it was the up-and-coming place in town. Now the city centre’s where things are happening. The numbers being done in town right now are insane, and we’ve just had a record-breaking week of takings. That shift wasn’t planned, but we landed in the right place.
What’s funny is that what drew me to Sheffield were traditional pubs, and now I run bars that are pretty American in style. But when I go out drinking, I still want places like The Union [Hotel] – pubs that feel like they’ve always been there, the kind that make you think you’re in the countryside even though you’re actually in Nether Edge.
It’s a welcoming city, but it’s also protective. Once you’re in, that protectiveness becomes a support network. Being an outsider has helped me see the place more clearly, but you also have to respect what already exists. You can’t just turn up and do it ‘the Brooklyn way’ – and I wouldn’t be dumb enough to try that.
Sheffield’s given me opportunity, but it’s also grounded me. It’s forced me to reckon with who I am and where I come from. It lets people be themselves without making a big deal of it. You don’t have to be better. You don’t have to be massively different. You can just be.
And for me, after everywhere I’ve lived, that’s kind of everything.
As told to Joseph Food.
Mike Pomranz is owner of The Old Shoe and Not Open; Don’t Come.
