Pizza Brain Not Open Yet, Still Trying To Set A World Record

So after all of our pizza exertions of the past several months–after all the eating, all the writing, all the making-a-super-sweet-pizza-finding-website-just-for-you–we really thought we were done talking about pizza. I figured that we’d pretty much had our say, and that Philly’s pizza community was as well-covered as it was going to get. At least for a few weeks.

But no. Just when we thought we’d found all the wonderful and terrible stuff there was to find, Brian “Brain” Dwyer (the man behind last year’s popular pizza-themed art show at Rocket Cat Cafe) got it in his head that someone needed to start collecting all the pizza culture memorabilia out there. That someone needed to catalog it and give it a home. And that that someone ought to be him

So that’s just what he did. After last summer’s show, Dwyer started gathering up pizza-themed LPs and video games, pizza boxes, pizza signs, pizza toys and pizza sculptures. He became, by his own admission, “obsessed” with getting his hands on more and more artifacts of pizza culture and was pretty much one step away from an appearance on that show Hoarders when it occurred to him that maybe he should open a museum, too.

Or, better yet, a museum with a pizza restaurant inside.

Or, even better than that, a museum with a pizza restaurant inside and a performance space, too.

Because, really, these days the difference between a clinical disorder and a viable business plan is nothing more than having a place to put all your stuff. Dwyer’s place? Pizza Brain.

And while his restaurant-slash-museum-slash-Fishtown-hang-out isn’t yet open (he’s looking at being up and running at 2313 Frankford Avenue sometime in the spring, with partner Joe Hunter running the kitchen and Dwyer in charge of the decor and amusements), that didn’t stop him from getting in touch with the people from the Guinness Book of World Records who, on July 31, will be making their way to Fishtown in order to certify that Dwyer does, in fact, have the “world’s largest collection of pizza-related items.”

Dwyer is so sure that he’ll be getting his place in the record books, that he’s turning the whole thing into a party and opening up his collection for a 1-day-only public viewing at Craft Hustle Art Gallery (20005 Frankford Avenue). The show starts at 1pm on Sunday, July 31st. The Guinness judge will begin his inspection at 3pm. And as soon as he’s done, he’ll announce whether or not Dwyer gets the record–at which point, celebrations will begin.

I’m guessing that there will probably be pizza served.