Upcoming Loop food hall at Wells & Wacker targets early 2018 opening

As work to transform the base of the Loop’s 1928 Engineering Building at 205 W. Wacker Drive into Chicago’s next destination food hall creeps forward, new information regarding the 10,500-square-foot establishment has come to light. This week, the so-called ‘Wells St. Market’ has revealed an initial line-up of four “anchor tenants” consisting of chefs Jimmy Bannos Jr. of The Purple Pig, Takashi Yagihashi of Slurping Turtle, Shin Thompson of Furious Spoon, and Jeff Mauro of Pork & Mindy’s.

The centerpiece of a $10 million overhaul overseen by Chicago architecture firm Holabird & Root, the project is being co-developed by Alvarez & Marsal Property Investments and Ameritus Real Estate Investment Management. Karen Herold’s Studio K—a firm best known for some of Chicago’s hottest restaurants as well as the Gold Coast’s Aurélien apartments—will spearhead interior design.

Jeremy Rumas

Jeremy Rumas

Following in the footsteps of The 24,000-square-foot Revival Food Hall in Chicago’s National Building and cuisine-specific offerings like Eataly and Latinicity, the destination dining court trend is building momentum in the Windy City. When it launches in early 2018, Wells St. Market will face competition from the following list of new food halls compiled by Eater Chicago:

• Forum 555, recently open in The Loop
• Beacon St. Market, targeted opening in 2018 in Uptown
• Lakeview Market, targeted opening summer 2018 in Lakeview
• Unnamed Time Out Fulton Market hall, opening TBD

First announced in mid 2016 with a summer 2017 opening date, the Wells St. project hasn’t exactly kept to schedule. An interior renovation permit calling for a “change of use to large assembly (c1) food court” was issued by the City of Chicago last month.

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• Wells St. Market food hall in Loop reveals opening chef lineup [Chicago Tribune]
• Here's the lineup for new food hall at Wells and Wacker [Crain’s]
• The Food Hall Trend Isn’t Ending in Chicago [Eater Chicago]