What's still open at the corner of Rose and Main? As of this fall, the honest answer is a 30-foot sculpture of a clown in a tutu. The two businesses that gave that corner a reason to stop are both gone. Neither space has a publicly reported replacement.
Walk a few blocks inland and the picture changes. In the 500 block, one 1,200-square-foot storefront has had three tenants since mid-2025. Its newest restaurant opened 50 days after the previous one served its last meal. Rose Avenue hasn't slowed down. Its activity has moved to the small rooms clustered around Flake, Venice Beach Wines and Chulita, and the corner that used to anchor the street is waiting on decisions nobody has announced.
Two corner anchors, two quiet storefronts
The Rose opened in 1979 inside a former gas company dispatch office at Rose and Main. For decades it was a gathering place for people from both Venice and Santa Monica. It had already survived one shutdown. After a few dark months in 2015, chef Jason Neroni and restaurateur Bill Chait reopened it that October. Chef Ray Garcia of Broken Spanish took over the kitchen in 2024. Its last service was Sunday brunch on December 15, 2024. At the time, Eater reported that no plans had been announced for the space for 2025 or after. We haven't found any news coverage since then naming a new tenant or a redevelopment filing for the building.
Across the intersection, the CVS beneath the Ballerina Clown closed on July 1, 2026. Prescriptions moved to the CVS at 119 S. Lincoln Boulevard. A store manager didn't give a reason for the closure, but did say it had "nothing to do with the statue." In mid-September, Westside Today described the corner as sitting empty after the summer closure and named no successor.
That's roughly 21 months with no announced next chapter for The Rose's building, and three months for the pharmacy space. Keep those timelines in mind for the next block.
The 1,200 square feet that refilled in 50 days
The address is 523 Rose Ave. Its recent history runs on a short timeline:
- Bluestone Lane held the space first.
- Cinque Terre West opened on June 23, 2025. Owners Marlo Vinzoni and chef Gianbattista "Gianba" Vinzoni had lost their Pacific Palisades restaurant to the fire. They painted the front a deep ocean blue and added patio seating for about 50. Before landing on Rose, they ran a combined Cinque Terre West and DELIzioso Cinque menu out of The Colony food hall on Lincoln Boulevard starting in March 2025.
- Cinque Terre West served its last meal on Rose on June 21, 2026, and the concept moved to Austin. The couple already run three Austin-area locations of Ciccio Bomba, an Italian bakery and cafe, in partnership with comedian Tom Segura, a former regular at their Palisades restaurant.
- Sticky Rice opened on Monday, August 10, 2026. It started with takeout only so the kitchen could settle in before the dining room opened.
From June 21 to August 10 is 50 days. In that time the storefront changed hands, changed cuisines and reopened.
Sticky Rice is the Thai street food spot David Tewasart started at Grand Central Market in 2013. He later partnered with Bryan Sharafkhah, who brought pad Thai cart experience from the Chiang Mai markets. The restaurant already runs locations in Echo Park, Highland Park and on 3rd Street. The menu includes pad Thai, pad see-ew, khao soi, crying tiger steak, sticky wings and curries. According to the restaurant's own Venice page, it serves dinner Tuesday through Sunday from 5 to 10 p.m. and is closed Mondays. The dining room is now open, takeout runs through a window and delivery is on DoorDash. Some roundups still list it as takeout-only, so go by the restaurant's page.
The neighbors that make a short vacancy possible
When Yo! Venice reported that Sticky Rice was coming, it described the location as a busy stretch of Rose Avenue near Venice Beach Wines and Chulita. That cluster is still intact. Here's the current lineup between Main and Lincoln, based on 2026 sources and the businesses' own pages:
| Address | Business | Current status |
|---|---|---|
| 425 Rose Ave | American Beauty | In Los Angeles magazine's August 2026 guide |
| 513 Rose Ave | Flake | Called a neighborhood staple in the same guide |
| 523 Rose Ave | Sticky Rice | Open since August 10, 2026, dinner Tuesday through Sunday |
| 529 Rose Ave | Venice Beach Wines | Lists hours seven days a week |
| 533 Rose Ave | Chulita | Lists 533 Rose as its current Venice location |
| 671 Rose Ave | Groundwork Coffee | Venice cafe listed with hours and online ordering |
Four of these sit within about 20 address numbers of each other. A restaurant in that group moves into a block that already has a wine shop next door and a breakfast spot a few doors away. Each new tenant inherits the foot traffic the block already draws.
The space itself is easy to take over, too. A 1,200-square-foot room with a patio for about 50 suits a single operator with a proven menu. That's what Sticky Rice brought from three earlier locations, and what the Vinzonis brought from the Palisades. Neither business needed to build out a large space or win approval for a new kind of use.
The big room at 305 Rose is still waiting on a parking answer
The project in the neighborhood that needs city sign-off shows the opposite timeline. A developer has proposed turning a historic church at 305 E. Rose Ave., which also fronts 254 S. Hampton Drive, into a private social club with coworking space. The city's August agenda described it as 5,765 square feet with 161 seats and 20 bicycle spaces. The applicant, 305 Rose Avenue, LLC, hadn't secured a tenant or operator, according to the city staff report.
City Planning staff recommended approving the private-club use. They also recommended denying the applicant's request to provide no parking, where the code requires 77 spaces. The public hearing took place on June 15, 2026. The item came back on the commission's September 2 agenda. As of early October the city's online case record still shows no action and no action date. Whether alcohol would be served is also unsettled. In May, Yo! Venice reported that the applicant had withdrawn the alcohol permit request, but the city's case summary still describes member alcohol service.
Sticky Rice handles the same parking question with one line on its Venice page:
Come hungry, park badly, we open at 5.
A 50-seat restaurant moving into an existing restaurant space can treat parking as a joke on its website. A 161-seat club in a former church needs a formal ruling, and that ruling has taken months so far.
The clown stays, whatever comes next
The Ballerina Clown, also called Clownerina, is part of the Venice Renaissance mixed-use building and isn't connected to the pharmacy lease. Developer Harlan Lee commissioned Jonathan Borofsky's piece in 1989. Lee grew up in Venice, and the circus clowns he saw as a child inspired the commission. Borofsky has said the figure fits the Venice Boardwalk because it brings together two opposite types of performers in one body.
Accounts differ on whether it still dances. A motor in its right knee once kept the leg in slow, constant motion until tenant complaints got it shut off. The Los Angeles Times reported in 2014 that Lee had repaired the mechanism and the figure was moving again. Some 2026 coverage says the leg has rarely moved, or not at all, in the years since. Either way, the sculpture stays with the building, whoever leases the ground floor next.
Nothing at Rose and Main signals what's coming. The pharmacy space and The Rose's former dispatch building both have no announced tenant. The 305 Rose decision is still pending with the West Los Angeles Area Planning Commission. In the meantime, the 500 block, from Flake at 513 to Chulita at 533, is where Rose Avenue keeps its regular hours.
If you own on or near Rose Avenue and want to talk about how changes at the corner and on the 500 block might affect your plans, Danny Mishevski follows these storefronts closely and is glad to walk through what each one could mean for your block. Let's Connect.
