Noe Valley Town Square Turns 10 and Starts Its After-Dark Season

"The new lighting is going to be essentially brighter, so people will be able to have more nighttime events there." Lighting designer Hubert said this about Noe Valley Town Square to the Noe Valley Voice in its October issue. The line also describes how the square is changing.

For ten years the square on 24th Street between Sanchez and Vicksburg has mostly worked as a daytime space. The farmers market fills it on Saturday mornings, and on weekends there are lunches outside and children playing. This winter's calendar runs later. The money, the programming and the 24th Street merchants are all heading toward the evening hours, and November and December show it most clearly.

A lot that was built around Saturday morning

The square started with a market. The Voice recounts that the parcel, a former gas station site and parking lot owned by the Noe Valley Ministry, became home to a weekly Saturday farmers market after the Real Food Company closed its 24th Street location in 2003. When the church decided to sell, a neighborhood campaign pushed for the lot to become a park and a permanent home for the market. The city bought it for $4.2 million, and the square opened in October 2016, three years after that purchase.

The market is still the base. According to the Town Square's events page, it runs every Saturday from 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Its regulars do more than shop. The September issue of the Noe Valley Voice reported that customers had given more than $12,000 to Herr Farms, a Saturday vendor, to buy an electric cooler for the truck that brings its harvest into Noe Valley each week. Town Square co-founder Chris Keene started the GoFundMe with $1,000.

A space designed around a morning market has a practical limit. Once the produce stalls pack up, the square depends on daylight, and in a San Francisco winter that runs out early.

Who paid for the light, and why

That limit is what the lighting upgrade addresses. The Voice reported that the project is funded by a $25,000 grant from Avenue Greenlight, a nonprofit, to the Noe Valley Association. The association is the neighborhood's community benefit district for the 24th Street commercial corridor and serves as the square's fiscal agent. The installation has 75 bulbs that Town Square events coordinator Moira Leslie Crawford said would be 50 percent brighter and give better light for nighttime performances.

Avenue Greenlight's stated reasoning is about the street around the square. It launched in 2020 to help businesses by improving commercial corridors so they draw more residents and visitors. Its board is made up of members and former presidents of merchant groups from across the city. It had already paid for the square's music series and for neighborhood promotion by the Noe Valley Merchants & Professionals Association. Elise Jacobsen, Avenue Greenlight's deputy executive director, put it plainly in the same article: "Lighting has been a huge priority for the board because it just improves the aesthetics of an area. We find it helps bring people out to a neighborhood's commercial corridor at night."

Crawford tied it to a specific event. "To have stage lighting is important for the Noe Valley Night Market and other events," she told the Voice. Hubert's design goal was about mood: "Having technology play animated patterns and subtle patterns makes an area feel more alive and have more personality."

The lights were scheduled to debut at the square's 10 Year Birthday Bash on Saturday, Oct. 24, from 6:30 to 8 p.m. It was planned as a disco party with CK the DJ, a cake donated by Noe Valley Bakery and prizes from local merchants. The same evening also marked the Noe Valley Association's 20th anniversary and served as a sendoff for District 8 Supervisor Rafael Mandelman, who leaves office in early January because of term limits after eight years.

The evening programming was growing before the lights went in. In September, the square partnered with Noe Music, the Sunday afternoon series based at the Noe Valley Ministry at 1021 Sanchez, on a run of free Friday concerts that started at 5 p.m. The first, on Sept. 11, was a Mozart divertimento played by Noe Music artistic directors Owen Dalby and Meena Bhasin with San Francisco Symphony cellist Anne Richardson.

The calendar from here to the end of the year

This is what's on the schedule for the weeks after publication. The listings are from the Town Square, the Noe Valley Merchants and the event pages linked below. Events listed for the evening are marked.

The daytime events are still friendly and low-key. Friendsgiving includes bingo, a dad joke competition, musical chairs, a gratitude tree and about a dozen local nonprofits on site, with treats and hot apple cider. Most of the bigger events now start in the late afternoon, though.

The Night Market is the regular one. The Funcheap listing for the series says it runs on the last Tuesday of most months, with live music, local retail and food vendors, and family activities, and it shows Nov. 24 and Dec. 29. The listing also sends readers to the Noe Valley Merchants' Instagram for the latest details, which is worth checking before you head out. The October market was billed on the merchants' site as running 4:30 to 8:30 p.m. with 24th Street closed to traffic, a bounce house, face painting and Lambert Moss returning as MC.

The Tree Lighting on Tuesday, Dec. 1, lights a 15-foot holiday tree. According to the Town Square, the program includes an LED acrobatic show by A&B Circus, caroling by the Loosies, balloon animals, cookies from Noe Valley Bakery, hot chocolate from Martha Brothers Coffee, and prizes from local shops, cafes and restaurants.

The Winter Wine Walk two days later moves the evening out of the square and along the street. Its Eventbrite page describes it as a festive stroll along a twinkling 24th Street from 4 to 7 p.m. There are three check-in points, and the first 200 guests receive a $10 voucher to spend at participating Noe Valley businesses.

What the Wine Walk route passes this year

The three check-in points are Noe Valley Town Square at 3861 24th St., the Valley Tavern Parklet at 4054 24th St., and Bernal Heights Pizzeria at 1361 Church St. Walking between them takes you past most of this year's storefront changes. Listed in address order from the square, then over to Church Street, these are the stops, based on the September and October issues of the Noe Valley Voice:

1. 3861 24th St., Noe Valley Town Square. This is the first check-in, under the square's new 75-bulb lighting.
2. 3901 24th St., at Sanchez. Pressed Juicery closed here in mid-August, and the 1,000-square-foot storefront has been marketed for a new tenant.
3. 3945 24th St., Fresca. The Peruvian restaurant reopened on Aug. 24 after a long closure for remodeling. In early September it added a weekday happy hour from 3 to 5:30 p.m. with discounted ceviche and oysters, as the Voice reported in October. When it reopened, its listed hours ran to 10 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays.
4. 3985 24th St., Small Frys. The children's clothing store plans to leave this storefront, across from Just for Fun, at the end of the year.
5. 4054 24th St., Valley Tavern Parklet. This is the second check-in. From 1976 to 1984 the address was home to Finnegans Wake, the pub where the Noe Valley Voice was first planned 50 years ago.
6. 4066 24th St. Small Frys plans to move back here, to the storefront where it opened 34 years ago. The space has been Moonshot Studio's since 2018. Owner Carol Yenne told the Voice the remodel "will be extensive," and she hopes to reopen in January with a wider range of clothing, including sizes for older kids, and "lots of sunlight coming through the front windows." Moonshot Studio, known for its individually scented candles, announced it would relocate "somewhere in the Bay Area."
7. 1361 Church St., Bernal Heights Pizzeria. This is the third check-in, on the Church Street side of the walk.
8. 1500 Church St., Eric's Restaurant. Alice's Restaurant, at 1599 Sanchez and 29th Street, closed permanently at the end of August after its owners retired following 30 years in the neighborhood. According to the Voice, Alice's staff moved to Eric's, which serves many of the same Hunan and Mandarin dishes.

Two blocks of 24th Street hold one storefront marketed for a new tenant, one restaurant that has reopened and added a happy hour, and one shop that hopes to return to its original address in January. Merchants are working through these changes while the corridor's own nonprofit and a citywide grant program pay to keep the street busy after dark. On Dec. 3, the first 200 Wine Walk guests will each receive a $10 voucher to spend at participating Noe Valley businesses.

If you're thinking about how the corridor around the square fits into your own plans for the coming year, I'm always happy to talk through what's changing on these blocks. Regina Gaspari is glad to connect, whether that's over a cup of Martha Brothers hot chocolate at the Tree Lighting or whenever the time is right for you. Let's Connect.