Drive down Calabasas Road past Sagebrush Cantina this month and something looks different for the first time in years. Two storefronts that regulars had mentally filed under "probably never" now have lights on, staff training, and in one case, a line out the door. Both sat empty long enough that most people stopped expecting anything to move in. Both filled within a few months of each other. And both are open, or close to it, right as the city gears up for the one day a year when nearly everyone in Calabasas ends up in the same field at the same time.
That's not a coincidence worth overselling. But it is worth noticing, because the timing tells you something about how this stretch of Old Town actually turns over, and what to expect walking around it this fall.
Two Storefronts, Two Different Kinds of Empty
The first is the small bungalow at 23538 Calabasas Road, directly across the street from Sagebrush Cantina. It spent most of a year dark after the Mulholland closed there in October 2025. In late July 2026, Jon & Vinny's took over the space, its ninth location and, according to a review from The Infatuation, possibly its cutest. The build-out kept the bungalow feel, added a full bar and a heated back patio, and attached a Helen's wine shop next door. It opened for breakfast, lunch, and dinner seven days a week, and it's already drawing comparisons to the chain's Fairfax and Brentwood locations for consistency.
Nine months is a short vacancy by Old Town standards. A few minutes away on Las Virgenes Road, the wait was closer to six years. Salsa & Beer Mexican Grill first put up signage at 4895 Las Virgenes Road, the old Coco's spot near the 101, back in 2020. That attempt never got off the ground. The storefront sat empty through the years that followed, and neighbors raised concerns at public hearings about traffic and parking on a parcel that sits right against the freeway. The city eventually signed off on restaurant use at the address, and by June 2026 owner Gabriel Huerta, who already runs Salsa & Beer locations in Lake Balboa and North Hollywood, told local reporters his crews were finishing construction inside. As of that reporting there was still no firm opening date. If you've been watching that corner for a while, the honest answer right now is: watch the signage, not a calendar.
Here's the timeline side by side:
| Address | Former tenant | Vacant since | New tenant | Status as of this fall |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 23538 Calabasas Road | The Mulholland | October 2025 | Jon & Vinny's | Open since late July 2026 |
| 4895 Las Virgenes Road | Coco's | 2020 (first attempt fell through) | Salsa & Beer | Construction finishing, no confirmed date |
What Filling Both In at Once Actually Means
Old Town Calabasas doesn't turn over fast. Sagebrush Cantina has held its corner of Calabasas Road since 1974, more than fifty years of the same address, the same live music calendar, the same Sunday brunch crowd. That kind of longevity is normal on this strip. What's unusual is having the two most visible gaps on the block close within roughly the same season, one after nine months of sitting dark and one after a false start that dragged on for the better part of a decade.
For anyone who's lived here through both vacancies, that matters more than the menus. A stretch of Calabasas Road that had two boarded storefronts for years now has none, at least for the moment. It's the kind of change you register on a drive to pick up dinner before you register it as a headline.
The Same Few Weeks, a Bigger Gathering
The timing lines up with something bigger than either restaurant. On Sunday, October 18, the city holds its Pumpkin Festival at Juan Bautista de Anza Park, and it's the closest thing Calabasas has to a single day when the whole town shows up in one place. The city's own event page explains the name behind it plainly:
"Did you know that Calabasas got its name from the Spanish word 'Calabaza' meaning 'pumpkin' OR 'gourd'?"
Local folklore traces it to a wagon of pumpkins that overturned in the area generations ago, scattering its cargo across the landscape until the name Las Calabazas stuck. The city has leaned into that origin story every year since, turning De Anza Park into a pumpkin patch, marketplace, and food court for one day.
If you're planning around it, a few details are worth knowing before you show up:
- The festival runs 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on October 18 at Juan Bautista de Anza Park, 3701 Lost Hills Road.
- Advance tickets are $15 online through October 17 at 11:59 p.m. Tickets at the gate are $20. Kids under 24 months get in free.
- Entrance and parking are only at the corner of Lost Hills Road and Agoura Road. The city is explicit that there's no parking or entry along Las Virgenes-Malibu Canyon Road, so plan your route accordingly.
- Leashed dogs are welcome on the grounds but not on the shuttles, and not in select children's activity zones or the food court.
- Food vendor applications closed September 6, so if you were hoping to snag a booth this year, that window has already passed. General admission tickets are still the way in.
The Rotary Club of Calabasas runs the festival's Beer & Seltzer Garden every year as its fall fundraiser, with 8one8 Brewing Co. out of Canoga Park pouring a seasonal fall brew alongside the usual pumpkin beer. It's a small detail, but it's the kind of thing that tells you the festival isn't just a city department running a rental company's inflatables. Local groups have a stake in it too.
What This Looks Like If You Live Here
Put the two threads together and the next few weeks have a shape to them. Jon & Vinny's is already open and taking reservations across from Sagebrush Cantina. Salsa & Beer is close behind, whenever its crew finishes the last of the construction. And on October 18, the same stretch of town that's been quietly filling its storefronts in will empty out toward Lost Hills Road for pumpkin carving, a beer garden, and whatever version of a hard-shell taco or roasted pumpkin dish shows up in the food court that year.
None of this requires you to do anything except decide where you're eating first and whether you're buying festival tickets in advance or taking your chances at the gate. But if you've been tracking those two empty storefronts as long as most of Old Town has, it's worth knowing both stories at once instead of stumbling on them separately.
If you're the kind of person who pays attention to which storefronts fill in and which ones stay dark, you already understand something about how neighborhoods hold their value over time. That's the same lens Denise Marks Group brings to Calabasas listings, watching the corridor, not just the comps. If you ever want to talk through what's happening on your specific street, request a free home valuation and we'll walk you through it.
