Two blocks separate the loudest weekend on the Sawtelle calendar from the quietest architectural shift the corridor has seen in a decade. On the last Saturday of July, the drum tower goes up on Corinth Avenue. A short walk west, at Olympic and Bundy, a dozen new tenants are papering their windows in a shopping center most residents still call "the aquarium." Both are Sawtelle Japantown. They are not the same Sawtelle Japantown.
If you live inside the Nebraska-to-Mississippi grid, this is your season. Here is what is actually opening, when the temple weekend runs, and how to plan a Saturday that hits both.
The temple weekend still sets the calendar
The West Los Angeles Buddhist Temple at 2003 Corinth Avenue has been running Obon since the early 1950s. The 2025 event was the 75th annual, with hours running Saturday 4 to 10 p.m. and Sunday 3 to 9 p.m. This year's dates are July 25 and 26, the last weekend of July, and the schedule has held steady: Saturday 4:00 pm to 10:00 pm, Sunday 3:00 pm to 9:00 pm. ABAsonics kicks off at 4:30 p.m. with West L.A. Taiko at 5:30 p.m., followed by the Dharma service.
Parking is the perennial problem, and this year the temple has published something new worth reading before you leave the house:
"Relaxed parking" will be arranged with the city, meaning attendees can park on the following blocks without being issued a parking ticket: between Nebraska Ave to Mississippi Ave (going North to South) and Corinth Ave to Colby Ave (going East to West). Negotiations are also underway to allow Obon parking in the Lumen's parking lot on Corinth Ave.
If you live inside that box, walking is the play. If you live outside it, the practical move is to park south of Olympic near the One Westside complex, eat first, and walk north to the temple by 5:30 for the taiko set. Which brings us to the second Sawtelle.
The Olympic-and-Bundy corner is doing something different
For most of Sawtelle's modern life, the food story ran north-south along Sawtelle Boulevard between Santa Monica and Olympic. That is still true on paper. In practice, a second cluster is forming south of Olympic in the West Edge and One Westside developments, and the tenant list reads less like an extension of the historic corridor and more like a distinct food court in its own right.
Here is the current opening board, all within a two-minute walk of each other:
| Address | Concept | Status |
|---|---|---|
| 11301 W Olympic Blvd | Korean Ice Co., serving bingsu in flavors including mango, red bean, ube, and matcha | Open |
| 11301 W Olympic #116 | Tres Dos Tres, a build-your-own fast-casual Mexican concept | In build-out |
| 11301 W Olympic #117 | Slizeria, pizza by the slice or pie with "fresh ingredients & unique flavors" | In build-out |
| 11301 W Olympic #118 | Ramen Chikumo, founded in Tokyo with two locations in Taipei | In build-out |
| West Edge (Olympic + Bundy) | Kinkan, Thai cuisine with Japanese influence, promising made-to-order chirashi bento boxes, aiming for a 2026 opening | Coming |
| West Edge, space 122 | Sudachi, name visible on the door of a new tenant space | Coming |
| 2212 Sawtelle Blvd (One Westside) | Ding's Noodles, promising "authentic Chinese noodles," appears to be their first location | Announced May 2026 |
The interesting thing is not the count. It is the mix. Read the tenant list of the historic Sawtelle spine, then read the list above. The spine is anchored by Hayama Restaurant (est. 1990), Tempura House (est. 1949), and Tokyo Central (Marukai). The new cluster is Taipei ramen, Thai-Japanese chirashi, Korean shaved ice, fast-casual Mexican, and by-the-slice pizza. It is Pan-Asian and Pan-American, packed into a leasing plan, and priced for a lunch crowd from the office towers rather than a Friday dinner reservation.
If you have lived here since the boba wave, you have seen this pattern before. The difference is density. Six confirmed tenants inside a single strip is not organic drift. It is a repositioning.
What's happening on the Sawtelle spine itself
The historic corridor is not standing still. A few openings worth knowing:
- Tsukiji Gindaco Sakaba, 2129 Sawtelle Blvd. Window paper is up on the old Sunmerry Bakery spot for a new izakaya-style outpost of Gindaco, which has locations in Japan and Gardena and specializes in takoyaki, fried balls of dough containing octopus.
- Chicken Bun Bun, 2222 Sawtelle Blvd. Now open, serving proprietary chicken sandwiches along with wraps, wings, and tenders; the third location for the mini-chain, joining Alhambra and Newport Beach.
- Yakun, at the corner of Sawtelle and La Grange. An ambitious upcoming opening in the former Mizu 212 space, with rumors of very high-end, reservation-only washoku squarely gunning for Michelin attention.
Yakun is the one to watch. Sawtelle has plenty of good ramen and plenty of good sushi. It has not, historically, had a reservation-book Michelin candidate on the strip. If it lands the way its build-out suggests, it changes the price ceiling of the corridor and the profile of who is driving in on a Saturday night. That is the kind of anchor tenant that pulls its neighbors up with it.
A Saturday plan that uses both Sawtelles
The rhythm of a temple-weekend Saturday, if you are already in the neighborhood:
11:00 a.m. Walk south to 11301 W Olympic. Bingsu at Korean Ice Co., or if the queue is out the door, hold for the ramen and pizza openings later this summer.
12:30 p.m. Walk north on Sawtelle. Lunch on the spine. Chicken Bun Bun at 2222, or hold for takoyaki at Gindaco once it opens.
3:00 p.m. Cross Olympic and head up Corinth. The temple grounds start filling by mid-afternoon.
4:30 p.m. ABAsonics on the stage. Food lines. Scrip tickets buy the food: beef and chicken teriyaki, wonton, imagawayaki, curry rice, Spam musubi, Chinese chicken salad.
5:30 p.m. West L.A. Taiko. Stand close to the yagura.
Later. The odori circle. Bon odori on the temple grounds, taiko performances, Japanese food from the community booths. The circle is open to anyone. The festival is free.
If you want to learn the dances first, practice starts at 7:00 pm on June 23, 25, and 30, and July 7, 9, 14, and 16.
Why this matters if you own here
Two things are happening to Sawtelle at once. The community anchors that gave the neighborhood its name — the temple, Nijiya, Marukai, Hayama, Tempura House — are still holding the center. And a new commercial cluster is forming half a block south of Olympic that is broader, denser, and priced for weekday lunches from the surrounding office and residential towers.
For a homeowner in West LA, the practical read is this: walkability from the residential blocks north of Olympic to the new Olympic-and-Bundy cluster is now the corridor's most underrated amenity. It is not on any listing sheet. It shows up in resale conversations only when a buyer asks, "What do you actually do on a Saturday?" This summer, the answer starts at 11301 W Olympic and ends at 2003 Corinth.
If you are thinking about what your block is worth in the current market, or how walkability to Sawtelle actually reads in an appraisal on a West LA single-family sale, that is a conversation the Ryan Shaw Group has often. Request Your Home Valuation and we will pull comps that reflect the corridor as it is being rebuilt, not the corridor as the portals still describe it.
