One Winnetka's Ground Floor Is Fully Leased. None of It Is Retail.
October 8, 2026
October 8, 2026
"I can't believe we have no retail in that whole entire building," Trustee Bridget Orsic told her colleagues at the Winnetka Village Council's February 17 meeting. She called the proposed tenants for One Winnetka "perplexing," and later "meh."
Eight months later, the lineup she was reacting to is the one moving in. The four-story building at Elm Street and Lincoln Avenue has topped off. Developer Murphy Development Group has told the village that the ground-floor commercial spaces are fully leased and were expected to be handed to tenants in October. Every tenant is a restaurant, a fitness studio or a service office. One Winnetka took more than a decade of deliberation before trustees gave final approval in January 2025. What it adds to East Elm is a set of places people book ahead, which changes when people come downtown and why.
The building totals 195,933 square feet. It holds 59 rental apartments on floors two through four and 19,600 square feet of commercial space on the ground level. Here is how that ground floor breaks down.
| Tenant | What it is | What we know about timing or location |
|---|---|---|
| Café Kosta | Ballyhoo Hospitality's Mediterranean restaurant | Listed as "Coming 2027" |
| FARE | Natural-food fast-casual restaurant | Commercial tenants expected to open in early 2027 |
| Solidcore | Fitness studio | About 2,300 square feet at 736 Elm St. |
| DUET Preservation Audiology | Audiology clinic | Storefront at 730 Elm St. |
| Winnetka Aesthetic Studio | Medical office | Special-use permit approved |
| Charles Schwab | Financial services office | Special-use permit approved |
Two of the six are places to eat. FARE already runs locations in Chicago and Oak Park. Its menu centers on seasonal bowls and plates, build-your-own bowls, breakfast and smoothies. That makes it the tenant most likely to fit into an ordinary weekday lunch on Elm Street.
Café Kosta is the restaurant that went through a name change. Ballyhoo first presented the concept as Arkadia. In June, the group's attorney told trustees that name could not be used and a new one was being chosen. Ballyhoo's site now lists it as Café Kosta in Winnetka, "Coming 2027," and the restaurant's own page carries one line of copy: "Gather Around the Hearth." The group already runs Pomeroy in Winnetka, Sophia Steak in Wilmette and DeNucci's in Highland Park.
The other four tenants run on appointments and memberships. You book a Solidcore class, a hearing evaluation, an aesthetics visit or a meeting with a financial advisor. You do not wander into any of them after picking up a prescription.
The developer has an explanation, and it's about lease terms, not demand. At the February meeting, Deirdre Clein of Murphy Development Group said, according to The Record, that the team had talked with several apparel and home goods companies and couldn't find a match. She also said the developer wants "stable and credible tenants" and requires "corporate guarantees to be signed as part of our leases," which narrows who can qualify.
"We heard the village over and over that you guys wanted retail … and walking around downtown, I really see why," Clein said. "We pursued that and there was nothing that ever came of it."
That requirement explains the lineup. A national fitness brand, a national brokerage office and an established restaurant group can back a lease with a corporate guarantee. Many independent boutiques cannot, even though independent shops are a big part of how downtown Winnetka feels. Solidcore was the closest call. The Plan Commission voted 5-3 against its special-use request in January, citing parking and fit within the village's retail overlay district. By June, the council had approved it as one of the building's six businesses.
These tenants are also arriving in a tight market. In its summer update, the village put Winnetka's commercial vacancy rate at about 2 percent, well under the 5 percent level generally treated as low. The largest open space was the former Green Bay Cycles storefront at 999 Green Bay Road, about 5,000 square feet. With so little space open across town, One Winnetka's 19,600 square feet is a large share of the ground floor that will turn over in the near term. That is why the tenant mix drew so much attention from trustees.
The corner itself changed in June. The original plan put a public plaza at Elm and Lincoln. On June 16, trustees voted unanimously to approve a "minor change" that turns that space into a seasonal outdoor dining area for Café Kosta, with 17 tables and 74 seats surrounded by planters of native grasses.
The village laid out the details:
Those hours explain the whole building. The busiest spot at Elm and Lincoln will be a dinner patio that opens at 4:30 in the afternoon, from spring through November. Ballyhoo's attorney, Christopher Canning, told trustees the dining area would bring more energy to the area than a plaza would, and pointed to the Winnetka caucus survey as evidence of what residents want. Put the patio together with FARE at midday and the appointment tenants during business hours, and the corner draws traffic across the whole day. The building gives people reasons to come to Elm Street on a schedule, and some of those reasons fall after the shops around it have closed.
Parking is the part that affects every resident, and the building does less here than people once expected. One Winnetka includes 151 enclosed spaces on the ground and lower levels. Of those, 39 are set aside for customers or employees of the commercial tenants. Developers had earlier committed those 39 spaces as public parking at ground level. In February, Village President Bob Dearborn said officials now feel that parking, first pitched as a public benefit, has been repurposed to serve the building's businesses.
Downtown parking was already strained. "I have talked to many retailers on that street and their hair is on fire about parking already," Trustee Rob Apatoff said at the same meeting. "It's already a beehive down there." In March, business owners told trustees that One Winnetka construction and ongoing parking problems were "severely hampering" customers' willingness to shop nearby.
When staff brought the issue back on August 4, the numbers pointed to a problem much bigger than one building:
| Measure (as of the Aug. 4, 2026 presentation) | Figure |
|---|---|
| Class A employee stalls, all three districts | About 540 |
| Class A permits issued | More than 1,000 |
| Indian Hill stalls vs. permits | 46 stalls, 140 permits |
| Class A permit fee | $10 a year |
| Class C commuter permit, resident / nonresident | $100 / $220 |
Measured against those numbers, the 39 tenant spaces are small. Employee permits outnumber employee stalls by roughly 88 percent across Elm, Hubbard Woods and Indian Hill. Staff named four recurring complaints: limited customer parking near businesses, limited employee parking, limited signage and students misusing permits. The ideas on the table included higher permit fees, escalating fines for repeat violators, tighter enforcement, a better permit-distribution process and possibly a mobile app for commuters. Those were proposals. As of mid-August, no follow-up meeting or implementation timeline had been announced. Deputy Village Manager Hannah Lipman set expectations plainly: "No solution is going to solve all of the problems."
Walsh Construction, the general contractor, began mobilizing the site last May. The village's update laid out the rest of the schedule.
None of the six tenants has announced a specific opening date. The building has already moved its finish date once. When the council approved it in January 2025, completion was targeted for October 2026. If the current schedule holds, the streetscape will be finished by winter. Café Kosta's 74-seat patio would then have its first full season starting April 1, 2027, the first day of Winnetka's outdoor dining season.
How the corner changes affects nearby property owners. The tenant mix brings more evening and appointment traffic, while downtown parking rules are still unresolved. Both matter to anyone who owns or is thinking of selling near the Elm Street district. If you'd like to talk through how One Winnetka could shape your plans, Jena Radnay is glad to share what we're seeing on the ground. Request a Private Consultation.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
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