Walk to the corner of Third Street South and Broad Avenue this month and you'll see it clearly: on one side, the new Olde Naples Hotel humming with rooftop pool traffic and the evening crowd spilling out of Annie's Bistro. On the other, sharing a wall with it, a storefront that was supposed to be open by now, sitting dark.
The storefront is one part of a wider picture: other businesses opened on nearby streets around the same time.
What Actually Opened, and When
The Olde Naples Hotel welcomed its first guests on May 15 at 200 Broad Avenue, between Third Street South and Gordon Drive. The official ribbon-cutting followed on June 11, with Naples Mayor Teresa Heitmann and Anne Camalier, whose family has owned the site for generations, cutting the ribbon together. State Senator Kathleen Passidomo was among the guests, a signal of how much civic weight this project carried after more than a decade in development.
The hotel's signature restaurant, Annie's Bistro, Bar & Bakery, runs on a format that shifts through the day: espresso and pastries in the morning, an American menu by evening, all under a gilded ceiling with murals by local artist Janine Wesselmann and a piano in the corner. The building itself was designed to defer to its surroundings rather than dominate them. Architect Tim McCarthy of Hart Howerton has said the team studied how the original 1889 Naples Hotel functioned as a gathering place before deciding to set the new building back from the street and break up its massing to match the scale of the cottages around it.
Plans for the Neighboring Storefront
As Gulfshore Business reported, the Olde Naples Building, more than a century old, sits on the same corner as the new hotel and shares an owner: the Camalier family. For years, the plan was for it to house a restaurant from Rick Doody, a familiar name in Naples hospitality, under the name JoJo's Bar. Doody signed his lease in February 2022. The project then absorbed storm surge intrusion from Hurricane Ian and a string of city permitting delays over outdoor dining and parking during the buildout.
Then, on the same day the hotel opened to guests, Doody got a call. Chris Camalier told him the family was reconsidering direction. Four days later, on May 19, Doody received a letter terminating the lease.
"It's just been a mess. It's a long story," Doody told Gulfshore Business.
There's no public word yet on what replaces JoJo's Bar on that corner, or when. JoJo's Bar will not open this year.
New Businesses Open on Nearby Streets
What makes this season interesting isn't that one deal fell through. It's that the neighborhood's actual growth happened somewhere else entirely, on streets that don't get the same attention as the hotel's opening.
A few blocks over, Flora & Fauna turned its longtime floral studio at 719 12th Avenue South into a full storefront, adding a champagne bar, a curated gift collection, and regular classes. It's the kind of shop that works as a stop before dinner or as the destination itself.
Perch opened at 370 12th Avenue South this season, a women's contemporary clothing boutique from a Vail, Colorado-based brand making its first appearance in Naples.
On Ninth Street North, Hayes Haberdashery brought tailored menswear, accessories, and custom footwear to a stretch that has historically leaned toward womenswear and home goods, filling a gap that's been sitting open for years.
Off Third Street South, Stefano Frittella opened La Salière, an Italian concept carrying the culinary lineage of Monte Carlo dining that dates to 1982. Frittella has spent years building his reputation on Fifth Avenue South, where he already owns several restaurants there. Choosing Third Street for this one, rather than expanding his existing footprint, is worth noticing. It suggests Third Street's slower pace is becoming a draw for operators too, not just diners.
Grappino Bakery has been running breakfast through dinner nearby, with fresh-baked breads, pastas, and desserts at a price point that actually works for a Tuesday morning.
None of these openings depended on the hotel. None of them are waiting on what happens with the Olde Naples Building. They happened on their own timeline, on streets a few blocks removed from the corner getting all the attention.
Why the Timing Matters More Than Usual
There's a reason side-street activity carries more weight for residents this particular year. The Naples Pier, the traditional gathering point for sunset and the anchor most people associate with an evening walk, has been closed since Hurricane Ian and is still under active reconstruction. Crews broke ground on the rebuild in January 2026, and the city's own project page shows work continuing through the summer, with concrete pours completed in late June and early July. A reopening isn't expected until sometime in 2027.
That means the usual evening routine, walk down to the pier, watch the sunset, wander back through downtown, doesn't have its typical endpoint this year. The beach itself and the Gulf view remain open, but the pier structure is a fenced work zone. For residents who'd normally route an evening around it, the side streets filling in with new shops and restaurants aren't just nice additions. They're absorbing foot traffic that used to have a different destination.
The Saturday morning routine hasn't changed, at least. The Third Street South Farmers Market, running since 1994 and still drawing close to 60 vendors, holds its regular 7:30 to 11:30 slot behind Tommy Bahama every week. It's one of the few fixed points in a season where a lot else has been in motion.
What This Season Shows
If you live in Old Naples, the takeaway is that the neighborhood's growth this year didn't concentrate on its most visible corner. It spread across 12th Avenue South, Ninth Street North, and the quieter stretch of Third Street, in storefronts that expanded, boutiques that arrived from out of state, and a bakery that just needed to fill a practical gap. Meanwhile, plans for the restaurant in the adjoining building changed, and no replacement has been announced.
That's usually how neighborhoods like this actually change. Not with one marquee opening, but with a half dozen smaller ones happening in parallel, on streets nobody was watching as closely.
If you're weighing what any of this means for property here, or just want a local read on where the neighborhood's headed next, the Peter T. Rose Team has been tracking Old Naples closely for years. Reach out any time you want a conversation grounded in what's actually happening on these blocks, including recent openings and changing storefront plans.