What's New in Biltmore Phoenix for 2026? The Corridor Shift

For decades, if you lived near 24th and Camelback and someone asked where the neighborhood "was," you pointed at Biltmore Fashion Park. That answer stopped being complete this year. Saks Fifth Avenue, one of the two original 1963 anchors, is on the closing list. Meanwhile, the block directly across Camelback Road has quietly turned into a second gravitational center. If you have lived here more than a few years, the practical map of your week is rearranging under you.

The anchor that isn't there anymore

On February 10, 2026, it was announced that Saks Fifth Avenue would be closing as part of a plan to close 8 stores nationwide. That is not a small tenant turnover. Saks was one of the two original anchors when the center opened in 1963, and RED Development, which took full ownership in late 2024, is now filling the space with a fundamentally different mix.

Here is what the incoming lineup actually looks like, in the language of square feet:

Read that column of adjacencies once and the pattern shows up. Herman Miller's 2,060 sq ft showroom sits next to Ralph Lauren, Alo Yoga takes 4,349 sq ft in the former My Sister's Closet storefront, and La La Land Kind Café fills a 1,261 sq ft space near True Food Kitchen. FP Movement will occupy a space between Rye 51 and Warby Parker, while [solidcore] will open a studio near alo. Lululemon will more than double the brand's existing footprint from 2,738 square feet to 5,666 square feet. Fitness, wellness, design furniture, a mission-driven café. What was a department store is being replaced piece by piece by things you do on a Tuesday morning, not things you buy twice a year.

Across the street, a second cluster

If the Fashion Park is repositioning, The Esplanade at 2425 East Camelback is having a full renaissance. Rick Phillips and Peter Hearn of 151 Hospitality have opened three restaurants there inside twelve months.

Little Pickle Jewish Deli came first. The Mercer arrived next, taking over the space that housed MercBar for nearly three decades. Phillips and Hearn redesigned the 3,000-square-foot MercBar space into a stylish American bistro and martini destination. Then, on February 2, 2026, they opened Camello. A colorful Mexican restaurant is joining the growing roster of fresh restaurants at The Esplanade, opening for dinner service on Monday, Feb. 2.

The name is not incidental. Camello's owners have described their new spot as "a luxurious and theatrical high-energy Mexican restaurant" whose name nods to the restaurant's views of Camelback Mountain. Sit on the patio, look north, and the mountain fills the frame. It is the same mountain you can see from the north edge of Fashion Park, which is exactly the point.

The operators say the quiet part out loud:

"We are seeing the renewed energy of the Camelback Corridor with The Little Pickle, The Mercer, our immediate neighbors at Esplanade and of course the social scene at Global Ambassador and Steak 44, and we wanted to be part of its renaissance."

That is a restaurateur naming the exact competitive set they moved to be next to. Three restaurants from one group, planted deliberately opposite an anchor-losing mall, next door to a Sam Fox hotel bar and an established steakhouse. The corridor is not one destination anymore. It is two, and residents get to walk between them.

The morning routine grew a new stop

PRESS Coffee is filling in the pedestrian gap. The new store, located near Camelback Road and 32nd Street, is scheduled to open this spring, will span 2,029 square feet and will feature 38 indoor and 48 outdoor seats, a conference room and patio with shade. Thirty-eight indoor seats plus a conference room reads like a coffee shop designed for people who work from home three days a week and want a change of scenery that is not their kitchen.

Consider what a normal Wednesday looks like once all of this is open:

1. Walk or drive to PRESS at 32nd and Camelback for an 8 a.m. cold brew and a laptop hour.
2. Cross to Fashion Park for a mid-morning class at [solidcore] or a lululemon errand.
3. Lunch at Camello, which has a daytime menu built for exactly this. Daytime guests can expect a relaxed, affordable lunch menu of tacos, bowls, salads and chips and salsa designed for busy professionals.
4. Coffee refill from La La Land Kind Café on the way back through Fashion Park.
5. Aeron Chair test-drive at Herman Miller because your home office chair has finally given out.

None of those five stops existed in that combination two years ago. Four of them did not exist at all.

Sundays now have a schedule

The other structural change is cultural. Biltmore Fashion Park has launched a Sunday afternoon art series that runs as a recurring calendar item, not a one-off. Dates include January 11, February 15, and March 15, 2026 at Biltmore Fashion Park, 2502 E Camelback Rd, from 1 to 5 p.m. The Art Walk is a Sunday afternoon stroll with drinks and bites through a series of gallery walls constructed in the outdoor mall area, in collaboration with RED Development, Axiom Contemporary Gallery, and Artlink Inc.

That is paired with a pop-up gallery presence inside the center. Biltmore Fashion Park recently welcomed Biltmore Fine Art, a limited-time pop-up gallery located across from Pomo Pizzeria, led by veteran gallerist Robert Casterline, co-founder of Casterline|Goodman Gallery, which has established locations in Aspen and Napa. Casterline runs galleries in Aspen and Napa. He did not open a pop-up here because Biltmore was already an art destination. He opened here because RED Development is building the audience for one.

What the redevelopment is actually aiming at

The public plan is not modest. One of the plans is a ten-story tower, which might include a mix of retail and restaurants, office, hotel, and residential space. Whether or not that tower is built on the announced timeline, it tells you what ownership is planning around. Read that alongside RED's own description of near-term work. Enhancements currently underway include upgraded landscaping, lighting, and placemaking elements, all slated for completion by 2026. Placemaking is an industry word for making a shopping center feel like a neighborhood square. The Sunday art walk, the wellness studios, the café-forward tenant mix, and the coordinated dining scene across Camelback Road all point at the same target.

Why this matters if you already own here

Two practical takeaways for someone whose house is within a ten-minute walk or a three-minute drive of 24th and Camelback.

First, the daily-use radius of the neighborhood has expanded east. If your mental map of "where I actually go" was Fashion Park plus the grocery store, it now reasonably includes The Esplanade, the 32nd Street PRESS, and, once open, the Sunday art walk. That changes which streets you use, which cross-streets matter, and which side of a given block feels closer to the action.

Second, the character of the tenants matters more than the count. A department store closing and being replaced with fitness studios, a design showroom, a mission-driven café, and a doubled-in-size lululemon is a bet on residents, not tourists. Owners near the corridor now live next to a set of businesses that get used on weekday mornings, not just Saturday afternoons. That is the kind of shift that tends to show up later in how homes in the surrounding blocks are described, shown, and valued.

The reason to pay attention now is that most of this is happening in a single twelve-month window. By the time the tower conversation moves from renderings to permits, the pedestrian pattern between Fashion Park and The Esplanade will already have set. The residents who know the corridor best are the ones already walking it.

If you own a home in the Biltmore area and you're starting to think about what these shifts mean for your specific block, or you're considering a move into the neighborhood and want a read on where the walking radius is actually strongest, Josh Gonzalez is happy to talk through it. Let's Connect.