The Bongiorno family, long associated with the Potato Barn in Mesa, has announced plans to build a new entertainment venue called The Nox on land near Ray and Sossaman roads in Southeast Mesa. The developers expect to break ground in the fall on what will be an 18‑month construction project, with an opening targeted for the first quarter of 2028. Company and development officials say the venue will be privately funded and that no public concessions have been requested from the city or state.
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Nighttime exterior rendering of The Nox in Southeast Mesa, showing the illuminated ‘THE NOX’ marquee and the building's main entrance (rendering courtesy Adaptive Architects).
Behind the project are Greg Bongiorno, the patriarch and founder of Potato Barn, and his sons Mike and Keaton Bongiorno. The family has said the venue is an extension of their long presence in the East Valley and a way to reinvest in the community that supported their business over decades. The Bongiornos were not available for comment on the announcement, but developer and designer teams have outlined the scope and ambitions for the new hall.
David Hrizak, CEO of Mesa‑based The Streamline Companies, which is developing the project, described the effort as the culmination of more than four years of planning. "We’ve been working behind the scenes for over four years, developing the right site plan, the right interior and the right types of finishes that will make this one of the top 10 venues of its size in the country," he said. Construction will be led by Milwaukee‑based general contractor CG Schmidt, with Mesa‑based Adaptive Architects handling architectural work and EPS Group serving as civil engineer and landscape architect.
Hrizak emphasized that the investment is private. "We have not asked for any type of concessions from the city or the state," he said. He also signaled the family’s intention to keep the booking and programming independent. "We will remain independent and bring a real music scene to Arizona," he said, indicating the venue will not be tied to major national promoters.
The Nox will be a two‑level performance theater with capacity for up to 2,000 patrons and a hospitality program designed to extend beyond the stage. Each level of the venue will include three full‑service bars and a dedicated kitchen, allowing for elevated craft cocktails, beer and wine, and chef‑inspired food options intended to complement events. The first floor is being designed to accommodate multiple seating configurations—auditorium, cabaret or roundtable arrangements—for concerts as well as corporate or educational events. The second level will be a VIP area featuring fixed seating and in‑seat food and beverage service.
Interior rendering of The Nox's main performance hall, showing a stage, packed floor, and tiered balconies as envisioned for the new Mesa venue.
On in‑seat service Hrizak said, "It will come directly to you. You never have to get up and leave your seat if you don’t want to." He identified Phoenix’s Van Buren as the nearest comparable music room but noted that venue occupies a retrofitted historic building and was not purpose‑built as a concert hall. "It’s a beautiful building, right?" he said of the Van Buren, which was originally constructed in 1929 for the Phoenix Motor Co. "This is going to be the first new concert hall development in Arizona to be built from the ground up in many, many years. Over those four years of design, we have changed reiterations a number of times to get the right seating capacity, the right sound and the right atmosphere within the venue itself."
Adjacent to the theater, the Potato Barn is constructing a 50,000‑square‑foot warehouse that will serve operational needs and act as an ancillary parking resource when The Nox opens. The venue will sit immediately west of the Potato Barn and close to the Loop 202, providing highway visibility and signage. Hrizak said the facility will meet Mesa’s parking code but that the team will also promote ridesharing—working with Uber and Lyft—to reduce onsite demand. Ticket buyers, he said, will receive discounted rideshare offers for event days. The Nox is also being positioned as a successor to a grassroots music program the Potato Barn launched in March 2020: a free monthly concert series, primarily featuring tribute acts, that runs through the summer and resumes in September with a final performance scheduled for December before operations shift toward the new venue. "We’ve been creating a music scene in the East Valley quietly through a grassroots approach," Hrizak said. "We’ve decided to stop in December of this year. It’s time to focus on The Nox and buy a ticket when you want to see the next show."
Design details include an exterior that mixes old Chicago warehouse brick and iron with prominent, city‑approved signage and video display boards to advertise upcoming events. The first floor will incorporate an outdoor patio, while the second floor will offer approximately 5,000 square feet of balcony space that can be leased for private events. The project team plans to equip exterior gathering spaces with heaters and misters and to pipe the interior audio to outdoor areas so guests stepping outside will not miss performances.
Rounding out the building program, roughly 75 percent of the structure will be devoted to the concert hall; the remaining space will house Hotel Umbrella Studios, a video production soundstage intended to accommodate commercials, television and film projects. Hrizak outlined the constraints of Arizona’s film incentive structure, noting that tax credits flow to production companies that meet certain spending and hiring thresholds and that the incentive is tied to the activity of a production rather than ownership of a venue. "This activity must be completed in a qualified facility within the state of Arizona," he said. "There is not one qualified facility within the state of Arizona. Even though we have this money earmarked as tax credits, the state can’t give it away because there is no qualified facility that meets it." Hrizak added that Hotel Umbrella Studios is planned to be the state’s first qualified facility and that the Arizona Commerce Authority’s film commission would then have a local option to refer productions seeking tax credits.
Hrizak described The Nox as a family legacy project for the Bongiornos. "The Nox is definitely a passion project of the Bongiorno family," he said, and recalled that Greg Bongiorno, who lives in Gilbert, purchased the land years ago initially with an eye toward storage and future expansion. While the property will house a significant new entertainment venue, the team says it is also intended as a way for the Potato Barn family to reinvest in the East Valley community that helped launch their business.
Construction is expected to move forward under the leadership of CG Schmidt with design by Adaptive Architects and site work by EPS Group. Officials say the project will remain privately funded and independent in programming and booking as it seeks to create a purpose‑built mid‑sized concert hall for the Valley and a new production resource for the state.
Official project materials update the timeline to mid-2026 construction start and late 2027 opening for the 70,000-square-foot venue, designed to serve more than 1.2 million residents across the Southeast Valley as a modular performance hall paired with a professional recording studio and flexible capacity for 2,000 standing or 1,000 seated. (thenox.com)
City planning documents for the site show Potato Barn submitted a proposal for a 48,000‑square‑foot single‑story warehouse on a three‑acre parcel at 7224 E. Seaver Avenue; Mesa’s Design Review Board discussed the plans on July 15, 2025, and the project narrative describes three driveway entrances and an interconnecting shared‑parking agreement linking the warehouse, The Nox and the existing Potato Barn.
The Nox’s official website lists a contact address of 7224 East Seaver Avenue, Mesa, AZ 85212 and an email contact of info@thenox.com.