When the Toluca Lake Chamber of Commerce and the store's team cut the ribbon at the new Gelson's on Riverside Drive this January, they were joined by a Toluca Lake resident who first shopped at Gelson's as a little girl, at the company's original store in Burbank. That store opened in July 1951 at Hollywood Way and Victory Boulevard, where a Petco stands today. myBurbank called the opening at 10067 Riverside Drive a return to the brand's roots, a few miles from where it began. Gelson's lists the opening date as January 28.
The bigger change came over the rest of 2026. Between January and October, three businesses settled onto Riverside Drive, and together they stretched the day on the street. A grocery coffee bar now opens at 6 a.m. A cocktail bar with a campground out back stays open until 1 a.m. on weekends. A sushi counter with omakase reservations covers the dinner hours in between. The Toluca Lake Chamber's Holiday Open House on Friday, December 4, is the first one held since all of that arrived.
The morning now starts at Riverside and Mariota
The Gelson's anchors a mixed-use building at the corner of Riverside Drive and Mariota Avenue. It's a small-format store at 9,672 square feet, open daily from 6 a.m. to 11 p.m., and it was planned with 50 team members.
What matters for a weekday on Riverside is the Gelson's Kitchen counter in the middle of the store. It has a full-service coffee bar, a soup-and-salad bar, a self-serve poké station, a pizza and Roman-style pinsa counter, and a full-service Thrifty Ice Cream counter. A café-style sidewalk wraps around the building, and the parking lot is behind it, off the drive.
That puts the earliest coffee and the latest ice cream on the corridor under one roof. In its own announcement, Gelson's calls the store a boutique grocery built for the neighborhood. CEO Ryan Adams told myBurbank the store "was envisioned with local tastes in mind."
The opening day also put money into the neighborhood. Gelson's gave $2,500 each to the Garry Marshall Theatre, Pawsitive Beginnings LA and Toluca Lake Elementary School, whose students performed at the block party.
The night now runs past midnight at 10111 Riverside
Nine months later, the other end of the day changed. Bar Harry opened the week of October 9 at 10111 Riverside Drive, a short walk down the same stretch from the new Gelson's. It's open seven nights a week starting at 5 p.m.
The closing times push past what Gelson's covers:
| Night | Bar Harry closes |
|---|---|
| Monday, Tuesday | 11 p.m. |
| Wednesday, Thursday | Midnight |
| Friday, Saturday | 1 a.m. |
| Sunday | 11 p.m. |
The project comes from Richard DiSisto, the Los Angeles hospitality operator behind Tipple & Brine, Tunnel Bar and Murph's Service Station. The bar says it spent more than two years developing it. Bar director Johnathan Fite came from Employees Only Los Angeles. Executive chef David Lopez has cooked at Alba, American Beauty, Mastro's Steakhouse Beverly Hills and Chi Spacca, according to Beverly Press.
The property is really two rooms. Up front is a dim, 1970s-leaning cocktail bar with booths, vintage princess phones and a mural of Debbie Harry. The theme is Harry before she became famous, the downtown New York years. Out back is Camp Funtime. In Food Journal Magazine's account, which drew on material from the bar's publicist, the name comes from a vintage summer camp T-shirt Harry wore in a late-1970s photo. The camp on the shirt never existed, so DiSisto and his longtime design partner Murphy Michaels built it.
Here's what's back there:
- An Airstream that works as the bar
- Picnic tables, booths and fire pits
- Vintage camp signs, a hanging canoe and oars
- Rotary phones from the 1970s mounted at the tables
- Half a boat hung from an upstairs balcony as the DJ booth, with a DJ playing everything from the 1960s through the early 2000s
The cocktail list includes the Bunny 68, with vodka and passion fruit foam, and the Chelsea Hotel, with gin, Aperol, rosé and Lillet. There's also the Funtime Old Fashioned, finished with charred marshmallow and graham cracker, which fits the campfire theme. The menu leans toward what the bar calls American comfort food. That includes Harry's Sliders on Wagyu with Gruyère, fried squid with kimchi aioli, a crispy halibut sandwich, steak frites, and beef tallow fries. Two mocktails, a Sour Fizz and a Pomegranate Buck, are on the menu for anyone not drinking.
Dinner in between, at 10658 Riverside
Farther along the drive, Akami Sushi has set up at 10658 Riverside Drive. What Now Los Angeles reported in February that Sushi Ran then held that address. Akami started in Arcadia at 506 E. Live Oak Avenue and also runs a restaurant in Monrovia at 929 W. Huntington Drive.
The menu covers sushi and sashimi, appetizers and Japanese-style entrées. Akami's site takes omakase reservations and highlights dishes guests recommend: the Bluefin Burrata, the Simon Roll, wagyu sushi and a Shio Koji Ice Cream for dessert. Diners were already posting reviews of the Toluca Lake location by early October.
Gelson's covers the morning and grab-and-go lunch, and Bar Harry's kitchen doesn't open until 5 p.m. Akami adds a sit-down dinner with a reservation, on the same drive you'd use for an errand or a nightcap.
The new day on Riverside, hour by hour
| Time | Where on Riverside Drive | What's there |
|---|---|---|
| 6 a.m. | Gelson's, 10067 | Coffee bar, groceries |
| Midday | Gelson's Kitchen | Poké, soup-and-salad bar, pizza and pinsa |
| 5 p.m. | Bar Harry, 10111 | Kitchen and both bars open |
| Dinner | Akami Sushi, 10658 | Sushi, sashimi, omakase by reservation |
| 11 p.m. | Gelson's | Closes, so the Thrifty Ice Cream counter is done for the night |
| 1 a.m. Fri–Sat | Bar Harry | Last call at Camp Funtime |
December 4 is the first Open House with all of it in place
The Toluca Lake Chamber of Commerce lists this year's Holiday Open House for Friday, December 4, 2026, from 5 to 9 p.m. on Riverside Drive. The Chamber describes an open-air evening across the business district. Shops open their doors, with lights, music, live entertainment, photo spots and family activities spread across several activity hubs.
Those four hours sit right inside the new schedule. Bar Harry opens at 5 p.m., the same time the Open House starts. Gelson's stays open two hours after it ends. Last year's event, on December 5, 2025, came before any of the three had opened. Toluca Lake Magazine's listing for that one was free and included a tree lighting, photos with Santa, and a Vendor Village at 4444 Riverside Drive. For this year's hub locations, check the Chamber's event page.
Here's a way to build the evening around the newer stretch:
- Start at 5 p.m. near Riverside and Mariota. That's when the Open House begins, and the Gelson's lot behind the building plus the sidewalk out front make an easy meeting point.
- Walk the shops while it's still early. That's the part of the night built for kids and families.
- Book dinner at Akami ahead of time if you want omakase. It's a Friday during the busiest night on the street.
- Finish at Camp Funtime. The fire pits come into their own on a December evening, and on a Friday the bar stays open until 1 a.m.
- Grab breakfast supplies on the way home. Gelson's is open until 11 p.m., two hours after the Open House winds down.
If you're planning a listing around the holidays, Riverside Drive's new schedule shows up in a home's story too. When a buyer can walk to a 6 a.m. coffee and a dinner reservation on the same street, that's worth showing on camera. Kym De Lorenzo builds video and marketing around the places that make a neighborhood what it is. If you're thinking about what your Toluca Lake home might be worth this season, request your free home valuation and we'll start with the street outside your door.
