Come up the stairs at the Damen Blue Line station and turn toward the six-way intersection. The corner storefront at 1542 N. Damen Ave. now has a new sign. Across the intersection, 1588 N. Milwaukee Ave. has been vacant for about a year and is waiting on its next tenant. Up Damen, a bagel shop that opened in May has given the neighborhood an argument it has been having on and off for decades.
None of these changes is big by itself. Taken together, they show where Wicker Park's turnover has gathered in 2026. It sits within a few minutes' walk of the train, and the incoming tenants are mostly brands that started somewhere else and are putting a Chicago location on one of the city's most visible corners.
Five Addresses, One Short Walk
Here is the stretch, as it has changed since last fall:
| Address | Previous tenant | What's there now or coming |
|---|---|---|
| 1542 N. Damen Ave. | Urbanbelly, which moved to Fulton Market in spring 2026 | Hattie B's Hot Chicken, scheduled to open Oct. 28 |
| 1588 N. Milwaukee Ave. | Starbucks Reserve, closed September 2025 | Blank Street Coffee, opening date not yet announced |
| 1563 N. Milwaukee Ave. | Not reported | Blundstone, announced for "this fall" |
| 1615 N. Damen Ave. | Dimo's Pizza | Call Your Mother, opened May 19 |
| 1624 N. Damen Ave. | Guzman y Gomez opened here in December 2025 | Closed May 22, 2026 |
All five addresses have changed hands or had a new tenant announced in 2026, and every new name on the list is a brand from outside Chicago. Hattie B's comes from Nashville, Blank Street from Brooklyn, Call Your Mother from Washington, D.C., and Guzman y Gomez from Australia. Blundstone is the Chelsea boot brand. The one independent on the list, Urbanbelly, didn't close. It moved.
The Corner That Started as a Pop-Up
Hattie B's at 1542 N. Damen is the change most people will see first, because the space is a corner storefront close to the Damen station. Block Club Chicago reported that the Nashville hot chicken chain planned to open there on Oct. 28. It is the brand's second Chicago location. The first opened in Wrigleyville in February, and a River North location is planned for next year.
The space was home to Urbanbelly, the Asian street food restaurant that opened in the neighborhood in 2016. Urbanbelly told customers it would serve its Wicker Park shop through late April before moving back to Fulton Market, as Block Club reported in April.
Hattie B's already has some history here. Its first appearance anywhere in Chicago was a 2019 pop-up at Dove's Luncheonette, and the company's executive chef, Brian Morris, said in the opening announcement that Wicker Park "is a special spot for us." To mark the opening, the chain worked with Paulie Gee's Wicker Park, just north near Milwaukee Avenue, on a limited-run pizza topped with hot chicken tender bites, Hattie B's barbecue sauce, bacon and a black-eyed pea succotash. It runs through Oct. 31 at $5 a slice or $37 a pie, and part of the proceeds goes to No Kid Hungry. The new restaurant will have indoor seating and a patio.
The Six-Corner Storefront That Has Been Vacant for a Year
Across the intersection, the next change is still pending. Starbucks turned 1588 N. Milwaukee into a Reserve location in 2017. Its windows look over the North/Damen/Milwaukee intersection. The store was among the roughly 20 Chicago Starbucks locations the company closed in September 2025, and the space has been empty since.
Crain's Chicago Business reported on Sept. 30 that Blank Street Coffee would take the space as its Chicago debut. Blank Street was founded in Brooklyn in 2020. It now has dozens of locations on the East Coast and in the United Kingdom, and it raised more than $100 million in venture funding this summer. It is known for matcha and latte drinks. In Time Out Chicago's Oct. 6 report, the company still had not announced an opening date.
So for now, a year after one national coffee brand left the most visible corner in the neighborhood, the next one has signed on without saying when it will open.
A block away at 1563 N. Milwaukee, Blundstone is opening its Chicago store. When Block Club reported the news on Sept. 24, the company had said only "this fall" and had not set a date.
Up Damen, an Opening and a Closing a Few Doors Apart
North of the station, two storefronts on the 1600 block of Damen show how quickly turnover happens on this stretch.
Guzman y Gomez, the Australian Mexican fast-food chain, opened its first Chicago restaurant at 1624 N. Damen on Dec. 11, 2025, as Block Club Chicago reported ahead of the opening. About five months later, on May 22, 2026, the company announced it was leaving the U.S. market and closing all of its Chicago-area restaurants, including the new one in Bucktown, NBC Chicago reported.
A few doors down, Call Your Mother Deli had opened in the former Dimo's Pizza storefront at 1615 N. Damen three days earlier, on May 19. It was the first Chicago location for the bagel shop that Andrew Dana and Daniela Moreira founded in Washington, D.C., in 2018. The business now has about two dozen stores around the country.
The Argument These Blocks Keep Having
The opening and the closing landed in the same week, and the timing restarted a long-running conversation. Block Club Chicago's June 2 report traced the debate over corporate and independent businesses in Wicker Park back through Starbucks, the Yeti store that replaced the Double Door music venue, and Barnes & Noble's arrival in 2024. The Yeti store closed in summer 2025, and Block Club photographed the storefront still empty in late May 2026.
In that report, Bill Jacobs, longtime owner of Piece Pizzeria and the attached Brobagel around the corner from Call Your Mother, said he posted on social media asking neighbors to support locally owned businesses. "We are the fabric of Chicago, the fabric of Wicker Park and Bucktown," he told Block Club. Ashley Ortiz, a co-owner of Antique Taco, raised similar points about the number of corporate taco chains that have come to the area. In the same article, she said the draw runs in one direction:
"It's what makes Wicker Park cool ... these smaller businesses, these independently-owned places, and I think that's obviously why businesses want to come here."
Block Club also spoke with people who see it differently. Amanda Kezios has run Mojo Spa on Milwaukee Avenue in its current form since 2003. She told Block Club that independent shops tend to stay through hard stretches and give the neighborhood its variety. Mindy Segal of Mindy's Bakery spoke up for the people who work at chain locations and said customers shouldn't be told where to spend their money. Andrew Dana told the outlet that he and Moreira still run Call Your Mother day to day. He described the company's partnership with the investment firm Invus as a way to grow, not a handoff of control.
The fall openings put this year's turnover in sharper focus. Hattie B's, Blank Street and Blundstone are all brands from outside Chicago, and all three chose addresses within a short walk of the Damen station. The independents named in the debate, including Piece, Brobagel, Antique Taco, Mojo Spa and Mindy's Bakery, are still operating on the surrounding streets. In this year's coverage, those businesses were the ones staying put while the storefronts around them changed.
The Calendar That Still Runs Through Here
The outdoor season has wrapped up. The Wicker Park Farmers Market at 1425 N. Damen held its last outdoor date of the year on Oct. 25, the same Sunday the Wicker Park & Bucktown Chamber of Commerce held its final Meet Me on Milwaukee and closed Milwaukee Avenue to cars from North and Damen to Ashland.
Here is what's left on the chamber's calendar through November:
- WPB Trick-or-Treat, Saturday, Oct. 31, 3 to 6 p.m. Participating businesses along the Wicker Park and Bucktown corridors hand out treats, and the chamber publishes a digital map of stops.
- WPB First Fridays, Friday, Nov. 6, 6 to 8 p.m. This is a free, self-guided art walk through galleries, artist pop-ups and artist talks across both neighborhoods. Stops are on the chamber's First Fridays map.
- SSA #33 Neighborhood Forum, Tuesday, Nov. 10. This is the public forum for the special service area that covers the business district.
- West Town & Wicker Park Bucktown Joint Business Mixer, Wednesday, Nov. 18, followed by WPBCC Women's+ Networking at Lost Girls on Thursday, Nov. 19.
The First Fridays route goes right past the storefronts in this post. The Nov. 6 art walk could be the first time many people walk the Damen corner with Hattie B's open, and it may be the first chance to check whether Blank Street has set a date for 1588 N. Milwaukee.
If you live near the Damen stop and want to talk about what this year's turnover means for your block, whether you're thinking about your own place or just watching the neighborhood change, I'm glad to walk through it with you. Giorgios Karayannis works across Chicago and Northwest Indiana with @properties Christie's International Real Estate. Let's Connect.
