Orinda Theatre Square New Businesses and What's Changing

Walk the pizza corner across from Peet's in Theatre Square and you'll find a space that has worn three different names since 2022. Cross under Highway 24 to the old Bank of America building on Orinda Way and the windows are still dark, more than four years after the bank moved out, waiting on a project that still doesn't have a confirmed opening date.

That gap is the actual story in downtown Orinda right now. The Village District and the Theatre District aren't simply "getting busier" at the same pace. One side is churning through new tenants every few months. The other side has been stuck behind fencing and revised plans since before most of the current storefronts existed. The difference isn't demand. It's what it physically takes to open a business in each kind of space.

The Pizza Corner Has Had Three Owners Since 2022

The address is 76 Moraga Way, across the street from Peet's, and it's been through a fast rotation. Nation's closed, Bravo's Pizza opened in the same footprint, and when Bravo's shut down, 8Moose Pizzeria took the space over. The whole arc from Bravo's departure to 8Moose's grand opening happened inside about a year.

That speed wasn't an accident. Tim and Eileen Alford had been building toward a brick-and-mortar spot for years, starting with a home pizza oven so big it sat in their driveway, then a run of backyard party gigs, then a regular stall at the Orinda Farmers' Market. When Bravo's closed, the kitchen equipment, the exhaust hood, the plumbing built for a pizza operation, was already sitting there. Eileen put it plainly: "Their loss was our gain."

That's the part worth noticing. 8Moose didn't have to build a restaurant from the studs. It moved into one that already existed and swapped the sign, the recipes, and the ovens for its own. The Alfords had also been in Lamorinda for two decades before they ever signed a lease, which is its own kind of head start. "We've been in the area for 20 years, so people know us," Eileen said, and she still works days as the director of child care at Los Perales Elementary in Moraga.

The Same Pattern Shows Up Almost Everywhere Else in the Square

Once you know what to look for, the pizza corner isn't the exception. It's the template.

Sharetea's old spot became Nine Tailed Fox, a boba and bubble waffle shop opened by a Miramonte High graduate and Orinda native. The former Subway became Shemroon Cafe, a Persian-style bakery and coffee shop at 2 Orinda Theatre Square, Suite 108, run by husband-and-wife team Aydin and Shabnam Ameli, who also operate Shabnam Pastry in Walnut Creek. Square Baby's old storefront is now Jen Frase Photography, a dog photography studio. And a space that had sat empty is now Lamorinda Atelier, a contemporary art gallery that opened last fall after owner Jules Dhond spent more than two decades working with collectors and artists around the world before deciding to bring that experience closer to home. She described her new neighbors warmly: "the theater itself, the barber shop, the new café, the Vietnamese spot, Saffron, they have welcomed me with love." That Vietnamese spot, Kibi's, is one of the square's few true long-timers, and rather than closing, it's relocating to a different storefront just across the courtyard.

None of these took years. Each one dropped into an existing retail box, mostly with the electrical, plumbing, and in some cases the kitchen hardware already in place, and turned it into something new within months. The square isn't so much filling up as it is recirculating.

The One Space That Isn't Being Replaced

Not every change in Theatre Square is a swap. Morrison's Jewelers, a fourth-generation family business that had been open more than 102 years, is closing for good. There's no incoming tenant lined up in its place, no press release about what's next. The sign in the window says the owners, Dave and Chris, are retiring.

That distinction matters. A pizza kitchen or a coffee counter is a box that almost any similar operator can step into. A century-old custom jeweler is built around one family's specific relationships and repair skills, not a floor plan. When that kind of business closes, there isn't an obvious next tenant waiting to reuse the fixtures. It's the one storefront in this stretch of downtown that isn't turning over fast, because there's nothing standardized about what it takes to replace it.

The Storefront That's Taking Longer Than the Others

Even inside the fast-moving part of the square, one project has been slower than the rest. Sorso Bar & Bites is set to take over the old Starbucks space next to the Orinda Theatre marquee, a spot that sat dark for a long stretch before anything moved in. The concept comes from Daniele Carsano, a 13-year Orinda resident who has been behind several Italian restaurant concepts around the Bay Area, including Mint 54, Montesacro, and Casa Barotti. Reporting from earlier this year had Carsano hoping to open by late spring or early summer, but by the most recent updates this past summer, no firm date had landed.

The difference here is the buildout. A boba shop or a bakery counter can open with a light kitchen and a straightforward permit. Sorso is planning a full bar with a broad wine list and an extensive cocktail list, which means a liquor license, a bigger kitchen footprint, and more inspections before the doors open. Even inside a square where turnover usually takes months, a fuller concept slows the clock down.

Across the Highway, the Renovation Nobody Can Rush

Then there's CreekHaus, the redevelopment planned for 31 Orinda Way, the site of the old Bank of America branch that closed in March 2022. This is the project on the other end of the spectrum from the pizza corner, and the contrast tells you almost everything about why some Orinda storefronts move fast and others don't.

The original 2023 approval called for renovating and expanding a 4,712-square-foot, single-story building into an 8,810-square-foot, two-level structure. Revised plans in 2025 pushed that even further, to 9,397 square feet with an added 540-square-foot third story for storage and rooftop mechanical access. When it eventually opens, CreekHaus is expected to be anchored by Equator Coffees during the day and a CreekHaus Beer Garden in the evening, with PizzaHacker handling food service in the beer garden. Launchpad Learning Lamorinda, a tutoring and after-school program for Orinda and Lamorinda students, now lists its own address as the second floor of the building, with a note reading "Coming August 2026." Friends of Orinda Creeks has weighed in too, generally supportive of the creek-facing deck concept but pushing to make sure the deck stays public rather than becoming restaurant-only space.

None of that is a small tenant improvement. It's a structural renovation with multiple rounds of city planning review, and even the developer's own language has stayed cautious. As recently as this summer, the project was still being described as having a fluid timeline. More than four years after the bank closed, the building still hasn't opened, while the pizza corner two blocks away has already changed hands three times in less time than that.

What Actually Stays the Same

If you live here, the two fixed points in all of this are easy to name. The Orinda Farmers' Market runs every Saturday, year-round, on Orinda Way in front of the Community Park, a run that's stretched on for decades. And the Thursday Nights concert series returns to Orinda Community Park each summer, running from June through early October with live music and food trucks, this year's lineup including The Kate Burkart Band, Salvage Title, Sixteen Scandals, and Tom and the Broken Hearts, plus the Rotary Club's annual Opera in the Park.

Everything else around those two anchors keeps changing shape. If you've been meaning to try Nine Tailed Fox's bubble waffles or Shemroon's Persian breakfast, the smart move is to go this fall rather than wait, because judging by the last two years, that storefront might carry a different name by next spring. The bank building across the highway, on the other hand, will very likely still be behind fencing.

If you're weighing what any of this means for buying or selling somewhere nearby, Jeff Snell has been watching this stretch of Orinda turn over storefront by storefront for a long time and is happy to talk through what it actually signals for a specific street or a specific home. No pressure, just a local conversation.