As of the first week of October 2026, five food and drink projects have been announced along the Russian Hill and Polk Gulch stretch of Polk Street. One is open. The other four are at different stages of slated, delayed or permitted. Looking at what each one plans to serve tells you more than any single opening. The bakery, the bagel shop, the coffee counter and the hand-roll spot are all set up for the hours before dinner. The evening projects in the neighborhood this fall are mostly up the hill, at the hotels.
So if you live between Jackson and Union and walk Polk every day, you're watching a daytime food strip being built one storefront at a time. On Nob Hill, the Ritz-Carlton, the Fairmont and Grace Cathedral are filling the evenings through December.
The one that's actually serving
Handroll Hawker opened at 2360 Polk St. on Tuesday, Sept. 29. The format is ready-made Australian-style hand rolls, and it's open daily from 11:30 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. Founder Romi Trower told Eater that in Australia the hand roll is "as common as getting a sandwich or a salad for lunch."
Those hours say a lot about the business. A 7:30 p.m. close means Handroll Hawker plans to make its money at lunch and early dinner. It fits the same daytime pattern as most of what's coming behind it.
Four storefronts, four different stages
Reading north up Polk by address, here is where each announced project stands as of Oct. 5, 2026. Opening dates for new restaurants tend to slip, so treat anything listed as "slated" as a forecast.
1850 Polk St., near Jackson: Freedom Coffee. This one is known only from paperwork. The San Francisco Chronicle reported on Aug. 22 that city permits show plans to turn the retail space, most recently leased to a Pilates gym, into a café. A jobs page for the company lists the 1850 Polk address. The company's jobs page currently lists no open roles.
2065 Polk St.: Jupiter Room. This is the one evening project on the list, a cocktail bar from Trevin Hutchins. Its own site says it "launches LATE 2026," with pop-ups first and the permanent space later, and it lists martinis, fries, late night and takeout.
2139 Polk St.: Lorella. This is the opening most likely to bring a line. Lorella is a bakery from Melissa Perello, chef-owner of Frances and Octavia, and pastry chef Melissa Loar. It grew out of the "Saturbake" pop-ups they've been running at Octavia, and the plan is croissants, sourdough and more. The SF Standard reported in July that it was slated to open before the holidays. The name combines the two chefs' last names and has no connection to Sorella, the Italian restaurant down the street. Expect strong demand. Loar told the Standard that when the monthly bake sale launched, "We sold out in like 10 minutes!" The Chronicle described the debut as "this fall." No public report has confirmed an opening yet.
2193 Polk St.: Bageletto. In April, the Standard reported a co-owner's estimate of "60 to 90 days" and a late-spring opening. Spring and summer have passed, and the company's own site still lists only its location at 76 14th St. No delay has been announced. For now the Polk location is simply unconfirmed.
Count them up and the pattern is clear. A bakery, a bagel shop, a café and a lunch counter sit between 1850 and 2360 Polk, and only one of the five projects is a bar. If even half of the pending openings land on schedule, the Russian Hill stretch of Polk adds most of its new food business before 7:30 p.m.
What to watch for on the walk you already take
On a street like this, construction is the news before any announcement is. Here's what each storefront is likely to show next:
- 2139 Polk is the one to watch. With a "before the holidays" target, signage or a soft-open date would most likely show up in the next several weeks.
- 2065 Polk has said pop-ups come first, so Jupiter Room may run temporary events before its doors open for good.
- 1850 Polk is still at the permit stage as far as public reporting goes. Visible build-out would be the first real sign of progress.
- 2193 Polk has the oldest forecast and the least recent news. Any activity in the window would be the first update since April.
Opening dates in this business move constantly. The Big Four on California Street is the neighborhood's most recent reminder. SFist reported in March that it was set to reopen March 17, after being closed since 2020, with new chef David Intonato and a redesigned dining room. That reopening came after years of waiting.
Meanwhile, up the hill, the evenings are booked
While Polk fills in its daytime hours, the Nob Hill hotels are building an evening and holiday calendar that runs from mid-October to the end of the year. Here are the dates worth saving, in order:
- Oct. 12: Bruma, the Ritz-Carlton's new cocktail lounge at 600 Stockton St., is slated to open. The menu runs from cocktails to a Wagyu smashburger and Dungeness crab rolls. Hoodline reported the planned weekly schedule as golden-hour aperitivo on Wednesdays and Thursdays, live jazz on Fridays and a Latin-fusion band on Saturdays.
- Oct. 13 and Oct. 15–16: The Masonic's October calendar lists Loathe on the 13th and Laura Ramoso on the 15th and 16th.
- Weekends, Oct. 17 through Nov. 22: Bruma's Fall Harvest Afternoon Tea is listed at $135 per guest before tax and gratuity.
- Saturday, Nov. 21, 11 a.m.: The Fairmont's Gingerbread House Lighting Ceremony, with the San Francisco Boys Chorus, is billed as the opening of the hotel's holiday season and the Carousel Bar. The same page describes the ceremony as opening the Winter Rooftop Faire too, though it lists the Faire's dates as starting later.
- Nov. 27–29 and Dec. 18–20, noon to 5 p.m.: The Winter Rooftop Faire is new this year. It's an open-air artisan market in the Fairmont's Nob Hill gardens.
- Through the end of December: AURA, the immersive projection-and-music show at Grace Cathedral, says it will stay "until December 2026, end of the year."
Put the two lists side by side and the neighborhood's fall splits into daytime on Polk and evenings and weekends on the hill. Bruma's opening is set for Oct. 12, the Fairmont's season starts Nov. 21, and AURA's run ends with the year. On Polk, the schedule depends on the build-outs: one open counter, a bakery aiming for the holidays and three storefronts with no firm date.
How a week might look by December
If the forecasts hold, a Russian Hill resident's week in December could include croissants from Lorella at 2139 Polk, hand rolls at lunch from 2360 Polk, Friday jazz at Bruma on Stockton, and a December Saturday at the Fairmont's rooftop faire, ending at Grace Cathedral before AURA closes. Today, Handroll Hawker is the only one of the Polk pieces you can visit. The Nob Hill dates are on the calendar, but Bruma still has to open as planned.
The storefronts on Polk are the part that will keep changing week to week, and a signed lease on your corridor can tell you about local demand before a menu ever does. If you want to know what these openings and pending build-outs mean for homes and buildings on your block, Jeffrey Marples can walk you through it. Request a personalized market consultation.
