Haight and Ashbury Has a Plan for a Music Hub, and Six Small Shops With Years Still Ahead of Them

At the corner of Haight and Ashbury, the Doolan-Larson building has had six front doors for more than a century. The storefronts at 1500 to 1512 Haight Street are each about 500 square feet, according to The San Francisco Standard. That is much smaller than a typical retail space.

In September, SF Heritage, which owns the building, announced a plan with Seattle radio station KEXP and Blue Bear School of Music that would turn those six doors into one. That one change drives the whole debate. Nothing about it will happen quickly, and the six shops will be on the corner for a good while yet.

Six doors at 1500 to 1512 Haight

The tenants are the corner most people actually walk past. SF Heritage's own newsletter listed them in 2024 and invited visitors to "check out and patronize all the Doolan-Larson Building retail tenants." The Haight Ashbury Merchants Association's 2025 directory gives the same addresses.

According to the Standard, all six rent month to month.

The storefronts were added after the house

The small size of these spaces goes back to how the building was put together. The Doolan-Larson building went up in 1903 and survived the 1906 earthquake. A few years later it was jacked up so six storefronts could be added along Haight Street. The retail floor was built onto the building afterward, and it was divided into small pieces from the start.

Those small pieces are where the corner's story was made. From April 1965 to 1968, the storefront at 1510 Haight was home to Mnasidika, according to the city landmark listing for the building. The Standard calls it the first hippie shop on Haight and credits it with popularizing denim bell-bottoms. Norman Larson bought the building in 1980, lived there, and spent years restoring it. KEXP's project page says he donated it to SF Heritage in 2017. SF Heritage also owns and runs the Haas-Lilienthal House as a museum.

Larson's gift came with conditions. The project's FAQ page says SF Heritage will keep ownership "consistent with its obligations under the Larson Estate covenant," and will oversee preservation standards even if a partner runs the building day to day.

What KEXP and Blue Bear want to build

KEXP's project page and SF Heritage's September 17 announcement describe the plan this way:

• A ground-floor "third place" open year-round, with hospitality and retail. SF Heritage CEO Woody LaBounty told the Standard it would be a cafe and "neighborhood living room" made by combining the six storefronts.
• Radio broadcast facilities, so shows could originate from the corner.
• A full floor for Blue Bear's music education programs.
• A rooftop venue for live music and community celebrations, planned for about 100 visitors.

KEXP started broadcasting in the Bay Area in 2024. LaBounty told the Standard the ground floor could be "open for the community both day and night." The Standard reports that the mayor and other city agencies have praised the project for connecting with the neighborhood's history in music and counterculture.

"Haight and Ashbury is the most famous intersection in the world. We owe it to history to make something amazing happen there," LaBounty told The San Francisco Standard.

Why six small doors are hard to replace

Small spaces matter because the Haight has so few empty ones. Citing the Haight Ashbury Merchants Association, the Standard reported in September 2026 that the neighborhood's retail vacancies had fallen from 32 at the pandemic peak to fewer than 10. A shop that needs about 500 square feet has very few places to move to.

That is the case the tenants are making. Before the neighborhood's 47th annual street fair, all six put up banners saying SF Heritage should "preserve community, not displace it." KEXP and Blue Bear had booths at the same fair to promote the project. Robert Emmons, who owns Welcome Haight & Ashbury, made the banners and matching T-shirts. "I wanted to make sure that people could see that there were six small businesses that would be pushed out," he told the Standard. He suggested the music organizations take the upper floors and leave the ground-floor shops in place.

The merchants association supports the six tenants. Naomi Silverman, the third-generation owner of Mendel's and a member of the association, told the Standard that "it certainly seems like everyone's intentions are good," but that "this is people's livelihoods." At that point the association was trying to set up another meeting with the project's leaders.

On the project side, KEXP CEO Ethan Raup told the Standard the merchants' reactions were "perfectly understandable." He said the plans will leave "lots of room for community input" and that KEXP will work with SF Heritage on a transition plan that tries to keep the businesses in the Haight. In SF Heritage's September 17 announcement, District 5 Supervisor Bilal Mahmood said his office would work with the merchants to support small businesses and the neighborhood.

The steps left before anything changes

KEXP describes the project as "not a sure thing yet." Several steps remain before the six doors become one, in roughly this order:

1. The boards decide. SF Heritage and KEXP have signed a letter of intent. That came after three teams submitted proposals in June and SF Heritage's board chose KEXP as the only finalist in August. The boards of both organizations still decide whether to move to the next phase. KEXP hopes to share an update by early 2027.
2. A lease is negotiated. SF Heritage keeps the building, and KEXP would hold a long-term lease. Key terms will be made public once negotiations are finished.
3. The money is raised. The FAQ says funding is "centered on a philanthropic campaign led by KEXP." The Standard reports KEXP must raise more than $16 million. The San Francisco Chronicle reported the cost will likely be well above the $16 million KEXP raised for its Seattle headquarters.
4. The city approves it. Plans have to be finalized and approved by SF Planning.
5. Construction is scheduled. The FAQ says a construction timeline will be set only after the lease is signed and the city approvals are in place.

On timing, the FAQ expects the tenants to "be able to stay until close to the start of construction." It says the steps before construction will take more than a year. LaBounty told the Standard that construction is several years away even in the best case, that the businesses can stay the whole time, and that the full project could take about five years.

The corner this winter

For now, the corner looks the way it has for years. The six tenants, which the Standard reports are on month-to-month leases, are in place while the two boards decide whether to go ahead. Holiday shopping at Welcome Haight & Ashbury, a watch repair at Haight Jewelry, a haircut at Nice Cuts, and a gift from Woot Bear or Aquamarine all happen inside the small rooms the plan is debating.

A few blocks east, another small storefront is about to change hands. Otra, the restaurant at 682 Haight, plans to close in early December, and its owners told the Standard that a new tenant has signed for the space. In a neighborhood with fewer than 10 vacancies, small spaces tend to be filled again quickly.

SF Heritage posts project updates at haightandashbury.org, and KEXP's next public milestone is the update it hopes to give by early 2027. The Haight Ashbury Merchants Association, through shophaight.com, is the group speaking for the six tenants during the community-input period that both organizations say is still ahead.

At Colleen Cotter, we follow changes like the Doolan-Larson plan because what happens to a neighborhood's best-known corner affects how people experience the streets around it. If you own near Haight and Ashbury and want to understand how a project like this could shape your block over the next five years, request a complimentary market consultation.