Why New Armitage Avenue Stores Keep Replacing Tenants

As The Real Deal reported, Brian O'Donnell of Armitage Properties, a longtime landlord on the strip, said, "It's good for landlords, but some mom and pops can't afford to stay."

Armitage between Halsted and Sheffield closed out 2025 at a 0 percent retail vacancy rate, down from 4.2 percent the year before. That year-end figure doesn't mean every new store replaced an existing tenant. The examples below include both stores taking vacant spaces and businesses moving to other addresses.

How Armitage's Retail Mix Changed

The pattern goes back to the deal that set the whole thing in motion. Levain Bakery, the New York cookie brand that had already opened in River North and the West Loop, wanted a third Chicago location, and it wanted Armitage. The only way in was 849 W. Armitage Ave., which meant Marine Layer, the apparel brand that had occupied that address, had to go somewhere else. Marine Layer didn't leave the street. It moved a few doors down to a 1,200-square-foot space at 825 W. Armitage, a spot that had just been vacated by the stationery shop All She Wrote.

Around the same time, Abercrombie & Fitch signed a five-year lease, with a five-year extension option, for 921 W. Armitage. That address had sat empty since the Chicago Bar Store closed. It was one of the corridor's remaining vacancies, and Abercrombie took it.

The 2025 changes included both a store taking a vacant space and a business moving to another address.

More Store Changes in 2026

This year's examples include moves to new addresses and stores taking vacant spaces. Tie Bar, the neckwear brand that started online and later opened a brick-and-mortar shop at 918 W. Armitage, relocated this summer to a larger, roughly 2,000-square-foot space at 1007 W. Armitage. President Michelle Kohanzo called it a milestone and a reflection of how far the company had come.

Baggu, the reusable bag brand that built a following in Wicker Park before expanding, opened its second Chicago store on Aug. 14 at 2118 N. Halsted St., in a 2,200-square-foot space that used to be a medical spa called It's A Secret. Toast, the British loungewear label, leased 908 W. Armitage Ave. this year for its first Midwest store, a two-story building that also holds a cobbler and an apartment upstairs.

Here's the shorthand version of what changed and where:

The examples include national and coastal brands, and they show more than one kind of move: some tenants took spaces vacated by other businesses, while Toast leased a space at 908 W. Armitage.

Other Businesses on the Street

The examples above involve mostly apparel, food, and lifestyle retail. They are only part of the street's business mix. A few doors down, at 1123 to 1131 W. Armitage, a mixed-use building anchored by The Goddard School just signed a 10-year lease renewal that keeps the preschool in place through September 2036. The same building holds Studio Lagree, Armitage Allergy & Asthma Associates, and a pet wellness studio called Bowie Barker.

The apparel and food turnover on Armitage is visible because storefronts change signage. The block also includes service businesses such as the preschool, fitness studio and vet-adjacent business.

How to Read Armitage's Recent Store Changes

Recent store arrivals on Armitage have come through more than one route: some took vacant storefronts, while others moved into addresses vacated by previous tenants. Marine Layer moved a few doors down as Levain took its former storefront. Tie Bar moved to a larger space.

A new sign can mark a business moving to another Armitage address or a new tenant taking over a space that had been vacant.

Lincoln Park's retail corridors change fast enough that it helps to have someone tracking them block by block, for the shopping and for how storefronts change over time. That's the kind of detail the team at Fogel Slate Group pays attention to on the ground, in Lincoln Park and the blocks around it. If you're curious what else is shifting on your street, or just want to talk through the neighborhood with people who actually walk it, schedule a consultation whenever it's useful to you.