Whole Foods Market has signed a lease to open a new location at 1639 N. Wells Street in Chicago’s Old Town neighborhood, filling a grocery vacancy that has persisted since Treasure Island Foods closed the location in 2018. Alderman Brian Hopkins of the 2nd Ward announced the deal alongside the Old Town Triangle Association and the Old Town Merchants and Residents Association on September 1, marking the resolution of a nearly eight-year effort to restore a full-service grocery store to one of the North Side’s most walkable residential corridors. The grocer and property owner will now move into the design, permitting, and construction planning phase, though an opening date has not been set.
Key Takeaways
- Whole Foods Market signed a lease for the 44,000-square-foot former Treasure Island Foods building at 1639 N. Wells Street in Old Town, which has been without a grocery tenant since 2018.
- Alderman Brian Hopkins announced the deal on September 1, calling the restoration of a full-service grocery store to the site a priority since the beginning of the redevelopment review process.
- The lease is connected to a broader redevelopment effort led by Fern Hill, which won City Council approval in April 2025 for Old Town Canvas, a 349-unit apartment tower at North Avenue and Wells Street.
- The Old Town location adds to an ongoing Whole Foods expansion across Chicago, with additional stores planned in Wicker Park and Lakeview.
- No opening timeline has been announced; the project now enters the design and permitting phase.
Eight Years Without a Grocery Anchor on Wells Street
The vacancy at 1639 N. Wells Street has been one of the most visible gaps in Old Town’s retail landscape since Treasure Island Foods, a locally owned chain that operated across Chicago for decades, shut down the location in 2018. The closure was part of a broader liquidation that saw Treasure Island exit all of its locations, leaving several North Side neighborhoods without a grocery store that residents had relied on for years.
For Old Town, the loss was felt acutely. The Wells Street corridor runs through a dense residential area bounded by Clark Street to the east, Division Street to the south, Halsted Street to the west, and North Avenue to the north, with a mix of historic brownstones, mid-rise apartment buildings, and newer construction that supports a steady population of pedestrian shoppers. A 44,000-square-foot grocery space sitting dark in the middle of that corridor created both a practical inconvenience for residents and a visual drag on a commercial strip that otherwise functions as a neighborhood Main Street.
Efforts to fill the space moved slowly. In 2023, developer Fern Hill signed a letter of intent with Commissary Market, a locally owned grocer that had been operating in the Gold Coast, to take over the Wells Street location. That arrangement did not materialize. As Fern Hill pursued approvals for a larger redevelopment project nearby, Alderman Hopkins made finding a grocery tenant for the former Treasure Island a condition of his support for the broader plan.
The Fern Hill Redevelopment and Old Town Canvas
The Whole Foods lease is part of a wider transformation underway along the North Avenue and Wells Street intersection. Fern Hill, the developer that owns the Treasure Island property through an affiliate, won Chicago City Council approval in April 2025 for Old Town Canvas, a 36-story, 349-unit apartment tower at the corner of North Avenue and Wells Street. The project is a multi-parcel redevelopment undertaken in collaboration with Moody Church, encompassing new residential units, parking structures, and ground-floor retail alongside the restored grocery space.
The residential tower and the grocery lease are legally separate projects and can proceed independently. A group of adjacent residential property owners filed suit in 2025 to block Old Town Canvas, arguing the city improperly rezoned the site. In April 2026, a judge sided with the city and Fern Hill in dismissing the lawsuit, clearing the way for construction to move forward.
The combined effect of a 349-unit residential tower and a full-service grocery store reopening within the same block radius represents a material shift in Old Town’s commercial density. The neighborhood has historically balanced its identity as a residential enclave with a lively restaurant and entertainment strip, anchored by institutions like The Second City comedy theater at Piper’s Alley. Adding several hundred new apartment units and a grocery anchor to that mix will increase foot traffic along Wells Street and reshape the daily patterns of a corridor that has already seen significant rent growth as development pressure intensifies across Chicago’s North Side neighborhoods.
Part of a Broader Grocery Expansion Across Chicago
The Old Town location is not an isolated opening. Whole Foods is also moving forward on new Chicago stores in Wicker Park and Lakeview. In Wicker Park, the Chicago Department of Buildings issued renovation permits in April 2026 for a Whole Foods conversion of the ground floor of the landmark 1920s Home Bank and Trust Company building, a space that had been vacant since CVS closed there in March 2023. In Lakeview, Whole Foods secured a site at 827 West Belmont Avenue in a former bank building that had previously been designated for an Amazon Fresh store before the company shifted its retail strategy toward expanding the Whole Foods brand.
The three-store push in Chicago reflects a national trend in the grocery sector. Operators across the country are planning nearly 21 million square feet of new store space in 2026, a figure driven by sustained at-home dining habits that took hold during the pandemic years and have not fully reversed, as well as the legal collapse of the proposed $24.6 billion Kroger-Albertsons merger, which had frozen urban site acquisitions across the industry while the deal was under regulatory review.
Whole Foods already operates 10 locations in Chicago, including stores in Lincoln Park, Lakeview, Streeterville, and the South Loop. The Old Town addition extends the company’s footprint deeper into the North Side’s residential core, adding a store in a neighborhood that had been relying on locations in adjacent Lincoln Park and the Gold Coast since Treasure Island closed.
What Comes Next for Old Town’s Commercial Corridor
Alderman Hopkins characterized the signed lease as a “concrete and welcome step forward” while noting that work remains ahead. The design and permitting process for a grocery buildout of this scale typically involves months of review, particularly in a neighborhood with active community associations and a historic built environment. The Old Town Triangle Association and the Old Town Merchants and Residents Association, both of which were party to the announcement, will likely have ongoing input as the project advances through permitting.
The Piper’s Alley complex at the northwest corner of North Avenue and Wells Street adds another layer of commercial activity to monitor. The complex, which includes The Second City, a recently closed XSport Fitness location, a Starbucks, and more than a dozen commercial tenants, is owned by a Fern Hill affiliate and could see its own changes as the broader redevelopment reshapes the intersection. Fern Hill has not announced specific plans for Piper’s Alley beyond its current tenant mix, but the combination of Old Town Canvas, the Whole Foods buildout, and the existing entertainment venues positions the North Avenue and Wells Street node as one of the most active redevelopment zones on the North Side.
For residents who have spent nearly a decade walking past a dark storefront where they once bought groceries, the lease signing closes a chapter that ran longer than anyone expected when Treasure Island’s lights went out in 2018.
FAQs
Where Will the New Old Town Whole Foods Be Located?
The new Whole Foods Market will occupy the former Treasure Island Foods building at 1639 N. Wells Street in Chicago’s Old Town neighborhood. The 44,000-square-foot space has been without a grocery tenant since Treasure Island closed the location in 2018.
When Will the Old Town Whole Foods Open?
An opening date has not been announced. The project is entering the design, permitting, and construction planning phase following the lease signing announced on September 1, 2026. Alderman Brian Hopkins said more details, including a timeline, will be released as the process advances.
What Other Whole Foods Stores Are Planned in Chicago?
Whole Foods is also expanding into Wicker Park, where renovation permits were issued in April 2026 for a conversion of the landmark Home Bank and Trust Company building, and Lakeview, where the grocer secured a site at 827 West Belmont Avenue in a former bank building. Both locations are in the permitting or construction phase.
What Is the Old Town Canvas Development?
Old Town Canvas is a 36-story, 349-unit apartment tower approved by the Chicago City Council in April 2025 at the corner of North Avenue and Wells Street. Developed by Fern Hill in collaboration with Moody Church, the project is separate from but adjacent to the Whole Foods lease at 1639 N. Wells Street. A lawsuit challenging the rezoning was dismissed in April 2026.
