“Richmond Buzz” is a recurring column on changes, tidbits and other news from the Richmond. Check out our Richmond webpage for more.
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The fog, dear reader, is rolling in. Here’s what we found under the grey skies.
Talk of the town (or, at least, the inner avenues) is Rose Pizzeria, the Berkeley-born, nationally recognized pizzeria that opened earlier this month at 1 Clement St. and Arguello Boulevard. The dining public, including, perhaps unsurprisingly, the mayor, swarmed the modern thin-crust joint.
Since then, wait times have been hours long, a worker there said. A sign was posted outside the restaurant informing would-be patrons that the restaurant was fully booked through mid-May, but that it was accepting walk-ins.
If you’d rather skip the wait, local classic Giorgio’s Pizzeria just down the block has been around since 1972 — a different experience, for sure, but where else can you get balls of raw dough to play with?
This is actually all old news. We’ve been following Rose’s Inner Richmond expansion since shortly after this western outpost was announced. On with the new.
A record number of tipsters (three) wrote in to inform your buzz correspondent about Ghien, a forthcoming banh mi sandwich spot at 407 Balboa St. near Fifth Avenue.
The first among those tipsters was Mission Local’s own Clara-Sophia Daly, who discovered the new addition to the neighborhood while getting her nails done at Luxury Spa next door. Now you know: the spa and the banh mi shop are both owned by the same people.
When the old computer shop next to the spa went out of business, the spa’s co-owner, Tuan Luu, said he and his wife took it as an opportunity to bring Vietnamese cuisine to the corridor. He said this shop’s opening has been about nine years in the making.
“It’s convenient because we’re right next door,” Luu said.
Luu said that Ghien will start with a limited menu of five sandwiches. Come in on Monday, May 11, for the shop’s soft opening and receive a free drink with every sandwich.
The rumor mill is also churning around a storefront nearby at 600 Fifth Ave, the former site of Tastebuds.
Mission Local can confirm the gossip that it will be yet another pizza joint, but the owner there requested privacy before they get all their pies in a row.
Head over to Park Life at 220 Clement St. near Third Avenue for “Mostly Water,” the gallery’s current art show up until May 17.
Local artist Shaine Drake practices “marbling,” a process that uses paint and water to produce works on paper of an abstract, marmoreal texture.
The One Richmond office at 802 Clement St near Ninth Avenue, an outpost of local nonprofit The Richmond Neighborhood Center, “is in kind of an uncertain state,” said the organization’s community programs director Yves Xavier. The food pantry there is no longer, but the Neighborhood Center will host an AAPI heritage night event May 29.
At the 4 Star theater, local artist Trinity Ace is gracing the stage for her first headlining show alongside her many-piece band May 9. Many members of the indie-Americana act hail from the Richmond District.
Your correspondent befriended Trinity and her band about a year and a half ago, around the time he started out covering the neighborhood arts scene. So yes, this is a bit of a plug — but hey, befriend your own neighborhood buzz reporter (wherever you are), and you, too, can see your ambitions memorialized in their biweekly column.
