WAL Public Market

I was pleasantly surprised at how fresh and tasty the food was at this restaurant! The pokey of the day was octopus, cilantro, cucumber, kimchi with chili oil. With a side of kimchi and white rice it made for a delicious light meal for two. They serve alcohol, with sake and beer, and I believe there are various restaurants inside of this little public square. We will have to try the other restaurants another time :-)

This is exactly what R Street needed. There was always a lot of potential for these pretty but relatively empty blocks, and now people finally have a reason to visit. The WAL (Warehouse Artist Lofts) Public Market is an eclectic collection of shops with enough variety to please any consumer. It includes rental units above.
Located in the historic Lawrence Warehouse, which is on the national register of historic buildings, the market has something for everyone. There are food options (which I have yet to try), some clothing stores like Shop Old Gold with some incredible vintage attire, and my personal favorite, Kicksville Vinyl & Vintage. the latter is a pairing of two vinyl dealers along with a furniture dealer in an eclectic little shop near the back end.
There are also art galleries and regularly changing artist displays. I love how some of the shops also utilize the main hallway to show off their goods. A very community feel, indeed.
The only negative is that WAL’s newness has attracted large crowds, especially at lunch time, meaning you’ll have trouble eating or just getting in the door to the shops in the rear if you come at that time of day. I anticipate the fervor will subside in the coming months and this will end up being a pleasant place for midday lunch and shopping.

7÷2÷15 Ate at Fish Face for lunch (yum poke, Track 7 IPA, and $ 3 bag of seaweed crackers), bought a $ 20 Smiths tank top at Old Gold, and browsed at Kicksville (specializes in records and vintage finds like a strip Tic Tac Toe game from the 70s).

They have a various stores located in here ~~ nice and simple exterior design. However they should get more seating a since there’s lots of dining options. I love this place and will return. I only tried their Poke Fish Face Bar and Metro Kitchen so I didn’t explore much but it looks like a fun place to visit if you’re in the area!

LOVE the WAL Public Market. Such a fun place for great food (Fish Face Poke Bar & Metro Juice and awesome vintage scores from Old Gold & Kicksville Vinyl & Vintage. Seriously
WAL has raised the bar for Sacramento. Love the preserved historic vibe to this 100 plus year old building. Sacramento need more of this!

Shopping & Perusing Amidst A Mixed Use/​Income Art Community In Historic R Street District.
SITREP
While having coffee at Southside Insight Coffee, my buddy Bambi & I ran into our friend Tim and he was filling us in on his happenings: he is now at Kicksville Vinyl & Vintage inside WAL (Warehouse Artist Lofts) — this is a community of 116 rental units (the «Lofts» part of this equation) with ground floor commercial & retail space (such as Tim’s store Kicksville).
Bambi & I decided this was worth a gander, and so we took our coffees and headed that way…
WAL-​SETUP
If you’re thinking this building looks familiar, that’s because it IS the historic Lawrence Warehouse, the main six-​story structure on this block that built in 1914 AND is on the National Register of historic buildings, and is one of this downtown hood’s iconic structures for more than a century now.
MISSION
WAL was «founded» to be a haven & living-​sanctuary for creative spirits & muses to «Live, Work, Learn & Collaborate with One Another» as it’s purpose statement says. To that end, everything about WAL promotes our Sacramento artist community and this is also a space where their artwork is exhibited.
The makes «unit /​income /​rent» matrix makes for an interesting read and the logistics of how this place is designed to help artists with their living expenses:

ART
And in the ongoing expression of WAL’s mission, the WAL (L) space of WAL will be filled with artwork from not only regional artists, but also many of WAL’s own residents. We’ve already seen some beautiful, gripping works already:
*Colorful Images:
*Beautiful Portraits:
THE STORES!
This is still a work in progress, and not everything has rolled out yet, but the ground floor commercial & retail space is already booming with some wonderful stores we got to enjoy today, such as Kicksville Vinyl & Vintage, Shop Old Gold and Benjamin’s Shoe Corp.
And it’s absolutely amazing who you will just run into *randomly* while exploring these new corridors of this living & retail space!
THE LOWDOWN
A beautiful, maximum «re-​use» of a historic structure in Downtown Sacramento, permitting our artist-​community to live, to work, and flourish.