"For six years, it's been waiting for us," Tyrone Redic Jr. told Eater Chicago. He was talking about 2528 N. California Ave., the old Good Fortune space, which opened in August 2019 and closed in early 2020. On October 1, he and chef Christian Hunter opened Hooligan there.
Hooligan follows the same pattern as the rest of Logan Square's fall openings. None of them is a new building. Each one moved into a room that had been empty for anywhere from three months to more than six years. The rooms that opened fast had been restaurants or cafes before, so the new owners mostly had to unlock the door. The ones that had to become something new are still taking years.
Six rooms, and how long each sat dark
| New business | Address | Previous tenant | When it went dark | Opened or planned |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chengdu Impression | 2770 N. Milwaukee Ave. | Chiya Chai | May 2026 | August 2026 |
| Siete Azul | 2333 N. Milwaukee Ave. | Chicago Diner | Dec. 12, 2025 | Oct. 31, 2026 |
| Mate & Company | 2778 N. Milwaukee Ave. | Buzz Cafe | 2022 | Late August 2026 |
| Hooligan | 2528 N. California Ave. | Good Fortune | Early 2020 | Oct. 1, 2026 |
| Logan Inn | 2001 N. California Ave. | Los Artista Food and Liquors | 2020 | Sept. 11, 2026 |
| Afterlife Bar and Grill | 3601 W. Diversey Ave. | Diversey Funeral Home | 2019 | Hoped for 2027 |
The fastest turnaround and the slowest one are both on this list, and the difference between them comes down to what the room was used for before.
The quick ones moved into rooms that were already set up for food
Chengdu Impression filled Chiya Chai's space in about three months. Chiya Chai closed in May after a decade on Milwaukee, and the Sichuan restaurant opened its fourth location there in August. Block Club Chicago reported that the owners "were quick to move on the spot." They added tables and changed the bar counter, and much of the interior looks the same as before. Chengdu Impression has been in Lincoln Park since 2013 and also has restaurants in Edgewater and Wicker Park, so the Logan Square room joined an operation that was already running.
Hooligan chose its space because the team was in a hurry. Hunter, who won a Michelin Young Chef Award in 2023, and Redic had hosted preview dinners for a Hooligan on the second floor of Time Out Market in Fulton Market. Then the food hall announced it was closing in January. "With a quick opening top of mind," as Eater Chicago put it, they wanted a space that didn't need much work. The 50-seat, 2,000-square-foot Good Fortune room was ready to go, and Redic said they could "walk in and make some quick modifications." Hunter calls the food "Third Coast-contemporary," meaning French technique applied to Great Lakes ingredients. The menu runs from a vidalia onion vinaigrette and a chicken liver parfait with hot water cornbread to paddlefish caviar from a producer near his Kentucky hometown. A $199 four-course menu for two starts with oysters and includes wine.
Siete Azul falls in between. The Chicago Diner closed its Logan Square location at 2333 N. Milwaukee on December 12, 2025, and its original Lakeview location stayed open. About ten months later, on Saturday, October 31, Luis Zendejas opened Siete Azul in the same room, and it was taking OpenTable bookings by November 2. It's a coastal Mexican seafood restaurant serving shrimp ceviche, scallops in poblano sauce and whole grilled red snapper. Zendejas, 24, is also an equal partner in his parents' 16-year-old restaurant, Las Islas Marias in Wheeling, according to Eater Chicago. The restaurant's own site says it's BYOB for now, with a $10 fee per six-pack of beer or seltzer or per bottle of wine, and no hard liquor. A full bar is expected in mid-November.
The slow ones had to become something new
Logan Inn's corner at Armitage and California was a store, not a restaurant. Los Artista Food and Liquors closed there in 2020. Block Club Chicago reported that the team spent two years turning it into a cafe, bar and private event space, and the work drew "curious looks and door knocks from neighbors" along the way. The cafe sits on the ground floor of the Logan Square SRO hotel at 2003 N. California, which reopened with 28 rehabbed rooms in 2024. Co-owners Kiva Wenig and Luke Blahnik own the building and both businesses. The day menu includes pastries from Meg Galus of The Good Ambler and Italian sandwiches on focaccia. Wenig's pick is the mortadella sandwich with burrata, pistachio pesto, honey and radicchio. At night the focus is classic cocktails, especially martinis, and Eater Chicago added the Logan Inn to its best-new-restaurants list in October.
Afterlife Bar and Grill shows how long that kind of conversion can take. Owners Valerie and James "Jim" Spyropoulos plan to turn the former Diversey Funeral Home at 3601 W. Diversey, closed since 2019, into a bar serving smashburgers and wings. Block Club Chicago reported in September that construction would take at least a year, which puts the opening in 2027.
Put the two groups side by side. Chiya Chai's room reopened about three months after it closed. The funeral home will have been empty for most of a decade by the time it serves its first burger.
The cafe room that waited four years
Mate & Company doesn't fit either group neatly. Buzz Cafe at 2778 N. Milwaukee closed in 2022, and Block Club Chicago reported the space "has been vacant ever since, with For Lease signs on both of its doors." So the room was already a cafe, and it still sat empty for four years.
What finally filled it was a local connection. Mariana Rossi and Jose Rivero, who own La Nonna at 3400 N. Lawndale Ave. in Avondale, have lived in Logan Square for close to 20 years. They wanted to open a cafe near home, and Rivero drove past the Milwaukee storefront earlier this year. They opened it with longtime friends Marcela Pricolo and Vincenzo Mendrano. The cafe serves mate, the Argentinian herbal drink, along with regular coffee, a lunch menu and Latin pastries baked at La Nonna. The owners plan to add Argentinian wine and charcuterie in the evenings once the city grants their liquor license.
Mate & Company and Chengdu Impression are across the street from each other, so one stretch of the 2700 block of Milwaukee got two new businesses in the same month. One room had been empty for four years and the other for about three months.
The lower stretch of Milwaukee may be next. Yaya Mas Greek Kuzina, which has been in Lincoln Park since 2024, has posted 2300 N. Milwaukee as its Logan Square address, a block from Siete Azul, with a menu built around hand-carved gyros, bougatsa and avgolemono.
The nights each room is closed
Because these are new rooms on older corners, their schedules don't line up. These are the most recently published hours for each:
- Monday: Logan Inn is closed all day. Hooligan is open for dinner from 5 to 10 p.m.
- Tuesday: Hooligan is closed. Siete Azul serves from 4 to 10 p.m., and the Logan Inn bar runs from 4 to 11 p.m. after the cafe's 7 a.m. to 4 p.m. day shift.
- Wednesday: Hooligan and Siete Azul are both closed, which leaves the Logan Inn bar, open 4 to 11 p.m., as the evening option among the places with published hours.
- Thursday: Hooligan reopens at 5 p.m. for its Thursday-through-Monday run, and Siete Azul is back at 4 p.m.
- Friday and Saturday: Siete Azul stays open until 11 p.m. The Logan Inn bar opens at 3 p.m. on Friday and noon on Saturday, and runs until 1 a.m. both nights.
- Every day: Mate & Company opened with 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. hours, and the owners told Block Club those could change based on customer feedback.
Hooligan and Siete Azul both take reservations on OpenTable. If out-of-town relatives are visiting later this month, Logan Inn's private Logan's Living Room seats 10 to 40 people, and a whole-venue buyout holds up to 150.
Our team works out of Milwaukee Avenue, a short walk from several of these rooms. If you're thinking about what a storefront on your own block could become, or what the openings nearby mean for your building, Camille Canales Group is glad to talk it through. Book a consultation with us and we'll walk the corner with you.
