If you have lived in Santa Monica for more than a summer or two, you already know the Promenade version of the season. Tourists, sunblock, a Ferris wheel photo. That is not the summer being programmed for you this year. The 2026 calendar reads like it was drawn by someone who wanted residents to leave the car in the garage and pick a corridor.
Three corridors, specifically. The Pier is doing a Route 66 centennial year. Montana Avenue has quietly added anchors that reset the northern end of town. And Colorado Center, the office campus most locals treat as invisible, is about to open its first legitimate neighborhood restaurant. Understand those three and the summer stops looking like a list of festivals and starts looking like a walking route.
The Pier is really doing Route 66
The Santa Monica Pier is the western terminus of Route 66, and the road turns 100 this year. The city is treating that as the organizing principle for the whole summer rather than a single-weekend event. The pier is celebrating the Mother Road's 100th anniversary all year long with free events across the city.
The most visible change is a tenancy swap. Rusty's Surf Ranch, which opened in 1994 in the former Crown & Anchor pub space, served as the pier's main live music venue for 31 years. The replacement is The California Roadhouse, a new restaurant and entertainment venue replacing the recently closed Rusty's Surf Ranch, and it is the project of Sean Ahaus, a Santa Monica native and current co-owner of VITO, a neighborhood restaurant at 2807 Ocean Park Blvd. that has served the community for more than 45 years. The venue is timed to the 100th anniversary celebration of Route 66, which is set to take place on the pier in April 2026, and its programming leans into live band karaoke, comedy, and student performances with the School of Rock and Musicians Institute.
The bigger draw for residents is Pier 360. The Santa Monica "Pier 360" Beach Festival returns June 27-28, 2026, bringing two action-packed days of ocean sports, live entertainment, beach culture, and community celebration to the iconic Santa Monica shoreline. It is free, all ages, and it uses the sand under the pier for lifeguard competitions, the Ghost Skate Jam, and the POP SK8 Roller Rink on the deck.
Montana Avenue's June resets the north end
Montana had a real June. The most talked-about opening was the The Win~Dow drew crowds around the block when it opened its new Santa Monica location at 930 Montana Ave., taking over a space previously occupied by the Go Get Em Tiger coffee shop. The room is small, the 50-seat restaurant was designed by the Klein Agency and features murals by Los Angeles artist KC Haxton, and the price is the point: a smashburger built around a single, purposefully affordable cheeseburger, a flat-top griddled patty smashed with onions, topped with American cheese, pickles and a pink house sauce served on a soft potato bun. Note the block. The Win-Dow just opened its seventh (yes, seventh) LA-area location in Santa Monica, which means there are now two very well-known, but very different, burger spots within a block of each other (the original Father's Office is a few steps away).
A short walk east, the gelato corner is doubling. On the city's north side, a second Santa Monica location of Italian gelato brand Bacio di Latte is coming to 1510 Montana Ave., next to Italian market Sogno Toscano. If you have been on Montana for a decade, you remember when a full-service Italian anchor there felt aspirational. Sogno plus Bacio plus Win~Dow now bracket the middle of the avenue with reasons to stay past sunset.
A few Montana dates worth putting on the calendar now:
- August 22, 2026 — It's the perfect way to celebrate an afternoon with your four-legged friend (Doggy Days).
- October 3, 2026 — Join us for the Montana Avenue Art Walk, a day-long celebration of art, creativity, and community in the heart of Santa Monica.
Colorado Center becomes a third anchor
The quietest structural shift this summer is not on a shopping street at all. It is at a 15-acre office park most residents have never had a reason to enter. A surf-inspired, all-day restaurant and community hub is set to open this summer at Colorado Center, joining a wave of new cafes and casual eateries taking shape across Santa Monica. Bower Santa Monica, spanning approximately 6,500 square feet, will offer food and beverage, health and wellness programming and what its creators describe as "socialization rituals" at the 15-acre office campus at Colorado Center.
Bower has a specific pedigree. Harper, the founding partner of Amigo Roasters and the restaurateur behind community-focused venues including Bondi Harvest, El Chucho, Palmys and Likeminded Wellness Club, said the restaurant draws its name from Fairy Bower, a break in the Cabbage Tree Bay of Manly Beach in Australia. The Australian frame matters because his prior rooms in Los Angeles all read as neighborhood living rooms rather than lunch counters. If Bower lands the way his other projects did, Colorado Center stops being a place you cut through and starts being a place you meet a friend.
The free calendar, stacked
Santa Monica is running an unusual amount of programming through public spaces this year. Enough that the paid options feel almost beside the point.
| Date | Event | Where |
|---|---|---|
| June 21 | Make Music Santa Monica | Miles Memorial Playhouse at Reed Park, Downtown Metro station |
| June 27–28 | Pier 360 Beach Festival | Pier and beach |
| July 4 | Fourth of July Parade + Revel Republic event | Main Street |
| July 19 | City-wide car-free festival | Promenade to Ocean Park Blvd, Colorado, Arizona, Pier |
| July 23 | State of the City | Ocean Park Branch Library and Main Street |
The context: On June 21, the city will launch Make Music Santa Monica, turning public spaces into free stages for music-making, performances, and community connection. The first event will include a Play Day in the Park at Miles Memorial Playhouse in Reed Park and a celebration near the Downtown Santa Monica Metro Station with live music, hands-on workshops, and soccer-inspired activities tied to the World Cup. That soccer thread runs through the whole summer, because the inaugural Santa Monica International Jazz Festival featuring Kamasi Washington shares a season with the Michelob ULTRA Pitchside Club on the Pier for World Cup viewing.
The car-free day is the sleeper. Santa Monica Block Fest Volume V turns the three blocks of the Promenade into an open-air celebration of electronic music, food, and local culture plus a popular Night Market. Spanning from the Promenade and LA Metro stations across to Ocean Park Blvd, Colorado, Arizona, and the Pier, the entire city will come together for a giant car-free festival on July 19. That is not a block party. That is essentially every corridor a resident cares about opened up to foot traffic on the same afternoon.
The summer belongs to whoever plans it as a walking radius. If you can get from Reed Park to the Pier without a car, the calendar is written for you.
A resident's Saturday, in order
Here is what the argument looks like on a single day, using the openings and events above rather than a generic guide:
- Coffee and a small errand on Montana between 7th and 17th. Stop into Sogno Toscano at 1512 for pantry items before the line forms.
- Late-morning smashburger at 930 Montana. Order at the walk-up window and eat outside. If the line is long, Father's Office is a few steps away.
- Bike or drive south to the Pier deck by early afternoon. During Pier 360 weekend, the deck is roller rink and skate jam. Any other Saturday, the Route 66 signage and California Roadhouse open the pier's old music room back up.
- Dinner at Bower once it opens at Colorado Center, or back to Main Street where the closure of Holey Grail Donuts at 2441 Main St. has made way for a new dessert concept. A notice on the door indicates La Diperie will be moving in. The chain, founded in Montreal in 2014, specializes in dipped ice cream, cakes, donuts and cookies served with a selection of chocolate dips and more than 20 toppings. With more than 65 locations across Canada and into Florida, the Santa Monica outpost would mark the brand's first West Coast location.
- End the night at a Locals' Night or a Make Music stage. Both are free. Neither requires reservations.
The through-line
Santa Monica has always had summer programming. What is different this year is the density and the geography. The Pier has a centennial to hang everything on. Montana has three new reasons to walk past 15th Street. Colorado Center is being converted from a lunch box into a hub. And the city has scheduled a Saturday in July where none of the corridors are open to cars.
For a resident, that adds up to a summer where the value is in commitment to a small radius rather than trying to catch everything. Pick a corridor. Walk it. The programming was designed around you being on foot.
If you are thinking about how these shifts affect what your street, your block, or your building is worth this summer, Gina Martino can walk you through what the corridor-by-corridor changes mean for value, presentation, and timing. Reach out to receive exclusive off-market listings and a considered read on your neighborhood.
