Irving Street's Quiet End Is Getting Its Cafés. Most of Them Aren't Open Yet.

The Inner Sunset's newest café plans are landing on the Fifth Avenue block of Irving Street, a few blocks east of the Ninth Avenue corner most people treat as the neighborhood's center. As of late October, nearly every one of those plans is still behind papered windows. The Ninth and Irving storefront that sat empty longest won't have a tenant serving food until spring 2027 at the earliest.

So late October 2026 on Irving is mostly a waiting season. The changes are real and they come with addresses. They are also slow, and they cluster on blocks that had been easy to walk past.

The block that was "neglected compared to Ninth Avenue"

That phrase comes from Yahya Munsar, who runs KJ Produce with his brother and father. In an October 8 Mission Local Sunset Buzz column, he described the family as trying to "make the block happen" on Fifth Avenue. The family opened the grocery at Fifth and Irving in 2022. Their next project is directly across the street: a Yemeni café and dessert lounge at 403 Irving St., planned for early next year.

403 Irving is the old Shin Dig space. Shin Dig was a small venue for weddings and special events, and the storefront has been vacant since around 2020. The floor-to-ceiling wine coolers are still on the wall. According to Mission Local, those coolers will hold grab-and-go meals. The café will have a full coffee bar, pastries from local bakeries, and trays of baklava made in house from his father's recipe. The detail with the biggest effect on how the block feels at night is the hours: open as late as 10 p.m.

"We are going to have a good, safe spot to serve food, to offer good coffee and to have late hangout hours for the neighborhood," Munsar told Mission Local.

The KJ café will be the second new café on that block. Next door to the grocery, at 424 Irving St., Abanico Coffee Roasters is building its second location. Munsar's plan for sharing the block is to be different on purpose. Abanico serves Latin American coffee, he'll serve Yemeni coffee, and his café will stay open later.

Abanico: a target date that came and went

Ana Valle opened Abanico's original roastery café at 2121 Mission St. in 2021. Hoodline describes it as Salvadoran-inspired and known for horchata-laced espresso drinks, and notes that Valle is a certified Q Grader. The Irving location is an expansion. Valle had started looking at spaces because her Mission lease was coming up for renewal. She renewed it in May, but by then the Irving storefront had caught her eye. "I liked it so much that I was like, 'Yeah we can do both,'" she told Mission Local in August.

The space has turned over quickly. It used to be a laundromat, then served as the office for paid canvassers working for Supervisor Alan Wong during the June primary. Valle planned one or two drinks found only at the Inner Sunset shop, alongside Abanico's regular menu. She was counting on foot traffic from UCSF and nearby transit stops even though the space is a few blocks from Ninth Avenue.

Valle told Mission Local the Mission location took two years to open, and she aimed for late September on Irving. Late September has passed. Abanico's own website still lists 424 Irving as "Coming Fall 2026," with no date or hours. Hoodline's September headline says the café "opens," but its article describes an opening still to come. So walk past before planning a morning around it.

Ninth and Irving waited even longer

The Fifth Avenue block was the overlooked one. Ninth and Irving, the busiest corner, had its own vacancy, and it lasted longer than anyone expected.

Reliable Rexall Sunset, the neighborhood pharmacy at 801 Irving St., closed in early 2025. As Mission Local reported in September, the empty storefront puzzled neighbors for almost two years. It sits on the busiest intersection at Ninth and Irving, with heavy foot traffic. Foot traffic alone didn't fill it.

Mama's Boy Pizza is filling it. The Oakland pizzeria opened in 2023, and its $5 to $7 New York-style slices made a top 10 national slice list. The timeline is long. The for-lease sign came down in early September, the co-owners were just starting on permits, and the hoped-for opening is spring 2027. When it opens, it will be steps from Arizmendi and a block from Pasquale's Pizzeria, a neighborhood fixture since the 1960s.

Why 716 Irving is still empty

The empty storefronts are a story about who gets a lease as much as about demand. Poke Origin at 716 Irving St. opened in 2017 and served its last spicy tuna bowl on October 1, when its 10-year lease ended.

UMe Tea, a Cupertino tea shop, was interested in the space around June. Owner Cyrus Shen told Mission Local that the landlord didn't want a tenant that would compete with Easy Breezy Frozen Yogurt next door. Mission Local also reported that UMe Tea would have counted as formula retail, the city's category for chains with 11 or more locations, which needs special permission from the Planning Commission to open. Shen has said he would be interested in Inner Sunset spaces as a third location for his Q Specialty Coffee.

Taken together, the 716 story, the two-year wait at 801, and the Fifth Avenue cafés show how these corners fill. The tenants who arrive are operators who want this block in particular: a grocery family opening across from its own store, a roaster who liked a "little spot" enough to run two shops, and landlords choosing tenants that fit the block.

Ninth Avenue, where the turnover already happened

A block north on Ninth Avenue, the openings and closings already happened earlier in the year. The closing came first.

Willow on the Green, the British-focused cheese shop at 1327 B Ninth Ave., sold its last cheese on May 2 and its last wine on May 3. Owner Alex J. Sinclair told Mission Local that the closure of a UCSF research center and the JFK Drive shutdown had brought fewer Richmond District residents into the Sunset. He still sells cheese through fairs, picnics, galas, and catering. Tight Knit Vintage & Modern planned an August 1 soft opening in the former Willow space, according to Mission Local's July column.

Then the opening. Maggie & Mac's at 1326 Ninth Ave. officially opened June 5, and owner Scott Morton said the neighborhood's appetite for French dip sandwiches kept outrunning supply. "I describe it as like drinking out of a fire hose," he told Mission Local. That's the one clear proof on this stretch that a new place can open and take off right away.

Where each door stands in late October

The table shows how much of the street's future runs on a 2027 clock. One business on this stretch has opened this year. The rest are announcements, a target that has slipped, or empty space.

The parts of the week that aren't waiting on permits

While the new storefronts wait, the steady routines carry the neighborhood. The Inner Sunset Farmers' Market runs year-round on Sundays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at 1315 8th Ave., in the parking lot off Irving between Eighth and Ninth. The Inner Sunset Flea takes over Irving between Ninth and 11th avenues on second Sundays, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. The 2026 season has one date left on its posted schedule. On November 8 it's "The Big Lunch & Annual Pie Contest."

Getting to the street is a little easier than it was in summer. Since August 29, SFMTA has run peak-hour N-Judah trains every nine minutes instead of every 10. That's close to one more train an hour through the Ninth and Irving stop at rush hour, while the corner beside it waits for its pizza.

I spent years in construction before real estate, and buildout timelines like these are familiar to me: permits, tenant improvements, and target dates that move. If you own on these blocks and want to understand how a new tenant like Mama's Boy or Abanico on the corner might matter for your property, Perry Kayasone can go through it with you block by block. Call Perry.