The building at 317 West Main housed Bozeman Machine & Tool for thirty-four years. The shop repaired combine headers, fabricated irrigation fittings, and kept a coffee pot on for anyone who walked in. It sold in March for one point two million to a Bozeman LLC registered to a Portland address.

The new tenant is Heritage Fabrication Collective. The space will offer curated metalworking experiences starting at three hundred fifty dollars per month for bench access. A founding membership includes a branded leather apron and quarterly forge nights. The collective’s website features moody photography of hammers on reclaimed barn wood.

“We’re not a makerspace,” said founder Tanner Vellum, thirty-two, who moved from Austin in 2021. “We’re a community anchored in material honesty.” Vellum previously founded a direct-to-consumer hatchet brand that paused operations last winter. He said the West Main location was chosen for its authentic industrial patina.

The building’s previous owner, Dale Hargrove, seventy-one, watched the walkthrough last week. He said the new rent is four times what he paid. “They asked if the three-phase power stays,” Hargrove said. “I told them it’s the only reason the place works.” The collective plans to keep the three-phase service but will relocate the panel to create a collaboration nook.

Bozeman Machine & Tool relocated to a quonset hut near the airport. Hargrove said the new rent there is twelve hundred a month. “Dale’s doing fine,” said his son, Travis, who runs the books. “He just misses the walk-ins. Said a guy brought in a sheared PTO shaft at six a.m. Tuesday. Fixed it by seven. That doesn’t happen at a collective.”

Heritage Fabrication Collective opens September fifteenth. Day passes are eighty-five dollars. The leather aprons are sourced from a tannery in Maine. The forge nights will feature guest blacksmiths from Asheville and Santa Fe. The building still smells like cutting oil and coffee. Vellum said they’re keeping the coffee pot. It’s a French press now.