“How hard could bagels be?” thought business school graduates Kortney and Zakk Waschuk as they hatched a plan for a counter-service restaurant in Red Deer. The couple soon got their answer: very hard. When best-effort trial and error failed, the Waschuks called in a pro.

Yes, bagel business consultants exist. Kortney and Zakk contacted Beth George, a New York-based bagel expert with more than a baker’s dozen years of experience, then flew out east to learn from the best. “The long and the short of it is, our reason for choosing bagels is that we just wanted to eat them,” Kortney admits with a laugh. To bring the physical space of Booyah Bagels to life, the entrepreneurs again outsourced to the experts: specifically, the team at Calgary-based Amanda Hamilton Interior Design (AHID).

“They wanted to create something that stands out,” recalls AHID creative director Amanda Hamilton. Industrial parks and big-box restaurants are common in Red Deer, and the Waschuks aimed to give their 1,600-square-foot space as much individuality as possible. Since most of that square footage houses the bagel-making equipment—including a steam-injected oven that eliminates the traditional boiling process—pops of personality needed to be full-frontal. (The Booyah Bagel team isn’t afraid of a little innuendo: they chose AHID for the company’s work on Strip Joint, a fried chicken restaurant and 2024 WL Design 25 winner, and they also celebrate daily bagel order number 69 by embarrassing the customer with a DJ horn sound.)

Booyah Bagels also embraces bold colour and fearless nostalgia. Kortney describes it as “1990s Miami new-wave food court” and Hamilton calls it “wild and wacky” and “rock and roll.” Purple tile grout and a standout blue-to-purple ombré wallpaper give the space a sense of playfulness, and bagel imagery is everywhere: the peekaboo cutouts in the display case are bagel-shaped, the door handles are half-circles, the washroom walls are a textured pink plaster inspired by strawberry cream cheese.

Since opening last summer, Booyah has become a bustling hol(e)y grail for Red Deer. It’s fitting that such a loud space is named after an exclamation, living up to the Waschuks’ dream of mimicking the chaos of a New York bagel shop. “We knew we were selling a traditional product, so we thought, OK, how do we put a modern twist on it,” says Kortney. The design was that cheeky secret ingredient. “We take our bagel game seriously, but we don’t take ourselves seriously,” Kortney adds, “so we might as well have a space that’s reflective of that.”

On the Menu

The Mr. Nova Lova 

Co-owner Zakk Waschuk says this take on the traditional lox bagel was a labour of love: “We were very picky on choosing the smoked salmon.” Pickled red onions, capers and fresh dill cream cheese make this sammie sing. 

The Greenwich 

The vegetarian Greenwich is fresh, bright and filling, with cream cheese, avocado, carrots, pickled red onions, cucumber, tomato, garlic aioli and Red Deer-grown aquaponic lettuce and microgreens.

Jalapeno Honey Cream Cheese 

Whatever kind of bagel you order (poppy seed, za’atar, rosemary and sea salt, whole wheat and spicy everything are all options) don’t sleep on the jalapeno honey spread. “We’ve never seen that at another bagel shop,” says Kortney Waschuk.