After Arnies, Edmonds Is Rebuilding Its Food Scene in Smaller Pieces
October 22, 2026
October 22, 2026
"After 45 years of service, Arnies Restaurant will close effective September 21, 2026. Unfortunately, the current business climate does not allow us to continue."
That's the sign that went up on the door at 300 Admiral Way, as My Edmonds News reported the next day. The rest of the notice thanked guests for "first dates, holidays, birthdays, proposals" and anniversaries. Anyone who has had a sunset dinner overlooking the marina knows the room it described.
Arnies left a large waterfront dining room with no successor. Meanwhile, the restaurants opening and adapting downtown this fall share a pattern. They start with a smaller default, leave room to grow, and let demand decide when to expand. The plan for the Arnies building, written more than a year ago, follows the same logic.
Arnies wasn't expected to close this soon. In June 2025, the Port of Edmonds signed a 50-year ground lease with 1010 Development for The Landing, the building at 300 Admiral Way that held Arnies and other tenants. When My Edmonds News covered the signing, it reported that construction was estimated to begin "sometime in 2029" and that Arnies and the other tenants would stay open until then.
Here's the timeline as of this week:
The Port and the developer haven't announced an interim tenant or a revised schedule. That leaves a gap of a few years between the last plate Arnies served and any groundbreaking on the replacement.
The 2025 plan doesn't recreate Arnies. 1010 Development, led by president Ryan Appleby, described a boutique hotel and wellness spa. The plan promised welcoming public spaces and places to eat for local residents, not just guests. "We have roots dating back five generations in Edmonds," Appleby told My Edmonds News. "It's an important place to us."
For the ground floor, the report described a walk-up coffee bar and café. Appleby pointed to the Sunday-morning cold-water plungers at the waterfront and said sauna services on the ground floor would let them "come right in." The building's footprint will stay the same, but the structure will be a complete teardown. The hotel would also join a short list of waterfront hotels on Puget Sound, alongside Mukilteo's Silver Cloud Hotel and Seattle's Edgewater Hotel.
So the planned ground floor serves people in small, frequent visits, like a coffee after the swim or a stop on the way past. The anniversary dinner that defined Arnies isn't what it's built around. Downtown, the newest kitchen opened with the same approach.
Rooster Bagel Cafe • Kitchen • Bar opened on Saturday, October 3, in the eggshell blue building at 515 Main St., the space The Loft used to occupy. It's chef and mixologist Niles Peacock's second Edmonds restaurant, after Niles Peacock Kitchen & Bar. The Everett Herald reported that the bagels use the same well-over-100-year-old sourdough starter as his award-winning pizzas.
The opening menu is short on purpose:
Everything else is planned for later. According to the Herald, Rooster will add breakfast sandwiches, chicken cutlets with bagel breading, and bagel chips and dip. Cocktails, beer, wine and adaptogen-based mocktails are expected this fall and winter. Rooster's operations lead told My Edmonds News that the longer-term vision is "a day-to-night neighborhood café, kitchen and bar, with breakfast, lunch, dinner and evening service," with hours extended gradually as the team settles in.
Chief operating officer Hillary Ness explained the concept's origin to the Herald. "The folks in Edmonds kept saying, 'We need bagels,'" she said. "Our intent is that we're going to intentionally grow with the city. And with the customer desires."
A restaurant that opens with four bagel flavors and a seven-hour day carries much less risk than one that opens with a full dinner service. It can let Main Street decide how big it gets.
A block over, an established restaurant has made a similar change. Girardi's Osteria on 5th Avenue, family-owned since 1999, redesigned its menu this fall. Owner Fred Milani explained the change to My Edmonds News:
"To combat rising costs, Girardi's has redesigned their menu to give you control over your dining experience and your check! Most dishes now feature a standard, economical portion, allowing you to enjoy a lighter meal or add extra meat to build the larger size you're accustomed to."
The weekly specials and the 20-plus happy hour items are staying. Arnies and Girardi's were responding to the same pressures. One closed. The other kept its kitchen and dining room and made the smaller plate the default, so diners decide how much to add.
That makes three changes in the same direction this fall: a waterfront plan built around coffee and a sauna, a new restaurant opening with four bagels, and a 27-year-old osteria putting a smaller portion at the top of its menu.
Admiral Way still has a waterfront dining room. Anthony's Edmonds at 456 Admiral Way serves on two levels, the HomePort dining room and the Beach Café, and takes reservations.
If you still have an Arnies gift card, two updates have come out since the closure. According to a September 29 My Edmonds News column, a lawyer's letter announced the pending dissolution of Arnie's Restaurants Northwest, Inc. The letter asks anyone with a claim to send their final invoice to [email protected], and the corporation will reply with instructions for filing a formal claim. The same column reported that Hook & Cleaver in Mukilteo, a former Arnies location, is taking Arnies gift cards for $25 off a $100 purchase or $10 off a $50 purchase through Thanksgiving 2026.
For a longer view of how Edmonds has fed itself, the Edmonds Historical Museum at 118 5th Ave. N. opened "From Farm to Table: The History of Farms, Markets, and Restaurants in Edmonds" on September 5. My Edmonds News reported that it runs until June 12, 2027. The exhibit covers local farming, general stores, cooking and restaurants across South Snohomish County.
| What | When |
|---|---|
| Rooster Bagel Cafe, 515 Main St. | 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. daily as of early October |
| Hook & Cleaver Arnies gift card offer | Through Thanksgiving 2026 |
| "From Farm to Table" at the Edmonds Historical Museum | Fri 1–4 p.m., Sat 9 a.m.–2 p.m., Sun 1–4 p.m., through June 12, 2027 |
| Estimated construction start at 300 Admiral Way | 2029, per the June 2025 estimate |
For now, a waterfront dinner on Admiral Way means a reservation at Anthony's, 456 Admiral Way.
What opens or closes near a home shapes how that home gets presented when it's time to sell. Larissa Wilson follows Edmonds changes like these with a designer's eye for how a neighborhood's daily routines come across to buyers. If you're thinking about what the next few years at 300 Admiral Way mean for your own plans, Schedule a Private Consultation.
Larissa's passion is helping people through the steps of buying and selling. She is willing to keep her clients involved throughout the entire process, but at the same time she doesn't want stress with the details, either, which is a part of what hiring her is all about! She knows the community and surrounding areas, including West Seattle, Greater Seattle and the Eastside.