If you live here, you already know two things about the summer of 2026. The north entrance at 9800 Collins is a moving target, and the Shops you have walked through for years is about to look different by fall. This is the in-between season. The expansion has not opened, but the first pieces of it are already trading.
That gap is what makes the next few months genuinely worth paying attention to. A steakhouse that took over one of the most recognizable rooms on property is already seating tables. A restaurant that closed in South Beach a generation ago is coming back. And the Village itself is running a summer calendar built around two anniversaries at once. None of that shows up if you only visit the Shops for a specific store.
What actually opened while you were away
The most consequential change on the ground floor is Slim's, restaurateur Stephen Starr's new steakhouse. It took over the original home of Makoto after Makoto relocated to a larger space in 2022, trading sushi for steak and channeling midcentury elegance with leather banquettes, vintage murals, and rich textures. If you remember the Le Zoo room, this is that footprint reimagined. Bal Harbour Shops itself is now describing Slim's on its channels as a steakhouse inspired by Hollywood's golden age of cinema, which is a fair summary of the interior.
Starr is not a stranger to this address. He also runs Makoto next door and, in Wynwood, opened Pastis Miami in 2023 with Keith McNally. His empire now spans 43 restaurants across six cities, and a recent New York Times profile described him as "the $400 million restaurant man," noting that nine of his places rank among the country's top-grossing independent spots. Slim's arriving in the old Makoto room is not a soft opening on the periphery. It is the anchor of the food and beverage story the Shops are telling this year.
The second piece is China Grill, returning to Bal Harbour after its original South Beach location closed. China Grill, the iconic Asian-fusion restaurant founded by Jeffrey Chodorow, will reopen at the Shops after closing its original South Beach location. Between Slim's and China Grill, the culinary lineup residents saw a year ago is not the lineup they will be dining from by the fall.
Why the food matters more than the fashion this year
There is a reason the F&B story is leading. In a recent interview, Matthew Whitman Lazenby, the fourth-generation family member running the property, framed the shift bluntly. "We've got restaurants doing in excess of $30 million, probably soon to be $40 million. As department stores become less relevant, and not producing the types of volumes they used to, we see the food and beverage kind of replacing them as traffic generators."
That is a specific claim, and it lines up with what he shared about the anchors themselves. The two anchors, Neiman Marcus and Saks Fifth Avenue, combined were down 26 percent in September and down 6 percent over the last 12 months. If you have wondered why the expansion renderings are so heavy on dining pavilions and open-air seating, that is your answer. The Shops are re-anchoring around tables, not counters.
Seasonality has already shifted the same way. Business at Bal Harbour Shops used to be mostly Thanksgiving to Easter, and construction was prohibited during that window. That is no longer the rule, because there are no bad months anymore in the Miami market. Which is exactly why the north-entrance work is happening now, in July and August, rather than being deferred to a "slow" season that no longer exists.
The detour, in plain language
If you drive in from the north side, plan accordingly. From Monday, May 26 through mid-July, the Bal Harbour Shops north entrance and exit at 9800 Collins Avenue is impacted between 7:30 AM and 6:30 PM, and the Shops are encouraging entry and exit through the 96th Street parking garage. A second closure follows in August. From August 6 to August 22, the main entrance and exit at 9800 Collins Avenue on the north side of the Shops will be closed Monday through Friday.
Practical implications for residents:
- Self-park and rideshare are being routed through the 96th Street parking garage on the second, GREEN level.
- Valet drop-off remains available at Saks Fifth Avenue, with car pickup at the Neiman Marcus valet stand.
- Coming from Collins Avenue on foot, the pedestrian walkway near the 9700 Collins block is still open into the property.
The routing details are worth internalizing before you meet friends for a Slim's reservation at 7:15. The 9800 Collins signal is where the friction is this summer.
What is coming when the ribbon is cut
Lazenby has said the expansion opens in the third quarter of this year. Through 60 years in business, there has been an unrelenting focus on luxury along with an appetite for growth, and in the third quarter next year, Bal Harbour Shops will cut the ribbon on a major retail expansion that has been long in the making. That interview was published in November, so the target window is Q3 2026.
The tenant mix is unusually detailed for a shopping center at this stage. The expansion will house 18 existing tenants relocating to right-size their space, including Akris, Isaia, Graff, Bottega Veneta, Zegna, Zimmermann, The Webster, David Yurman, and Etro. It will also house retailers coming to Bal Harbour Shops for the first time, such as L'Agence, Toteme, and Peserico, and others who left and are returning. With several brands relocating to the expansion, Prada, Balenciaga, Saint Laurent, and Brioni will be able to enlarge their shops in older sections.
For anyone who has walked the property enough to know which storefronts are where, that is a meaningful reshuffle. Prada gets more room. Bottega moves. A boutique like Toteme, which most Miami shoppers currently drive to Design District or Aventura to find, will be a block from the beach. The scale of the expansion is on the same order as the property's own history. Coinciding with its 60th anniversary, the next phase will introduce more than 30 new stores and expansions to existing boutiques, with a strong focus on luxury and experiential brands.
Financing is in place. Whitman Family Development recently secured a $740 million loan to fund construction and continued growth.
The other calendar: the Village's 80th year
While the Shops handle the retail story, the Village government is running its own program on the sand. It happens to coincide with two anniversaries. From the Village calendar, the July 4 beach celebration honors America's 250th anniversary and the Village's 80th year, and the summer lineup includes a Full Moon Yoga session on the beach, a Silver Screen showing of The Devil Wears Prada presented in partnership with the Miami Film Festival, a park experience presented with the Museum of Contemporary Art, and a private evening at the Museum of Miami for Bal Harbour guests in celebration of America's 250th anniversary.
That is a denser resident calendar than the Village has run in past summers, and it is deliberately not tied to a purchase at the Shops. If you have children out of school or family visiting, the beach and the park are doing more of the entertaining this year than the retail floor.
Worth remembering as you walk east from the Shops: on the Kane Concourse median, Robert Indiana's Love sculpture sits on the easternmost median, nestled among the palms. It is a small thing, but it is the piece of public art that most out-of-town guests miss and most residents forget to point out.
One block west, at 1177 Kane Concourse
The Bal Harbour story does not end at 96th Street. A short walk across the causeway, The Well Bay Harbor Islands opened its residences this spring, and its members' club is next.
The first branded residential development from health and wellness service company The Well has opened in Miami's Bay Harbor Islands. Developer Terra received a temporary certificate of occupancy for a mixed-use development that combines luxury residences with 102,000 square feet of high-end office space at 1177 Kane Concourse. Office leasing is nearly complete. The office component is 90% leased to a mix of financial services firms, creative businesses, and family offices, including seven-time Super Bowl champion Tom Brady's Tom Brady Enterprises.
The club itself is the piece with resident-scale implications. A third component of the development, a residents' and members' club, will expand the property's wellness offerings with another 16,000 square feet of wellness amenities. The club is set to open later this summer, and a GoldenGood Market and Eatery will open next year. What sets it apart on the island is a specific piece of programming. The wellness amenities will include what The Well says will be Miami's first caldarium, a saunarium, and a halotherapy steam room as part of the club's Bathhouse.
If you have been debating whether to add a wellness membership somewhere in Aventura or on the Beach, the walk to 1177 Kane is short enough to change the calculation.
Reading the summer forward
Two things stand out when you put the pieces next to each other. The first is that Bal Harbour is not waiting for the expansion. Slim's is already open. Construction detours are already in effect. The Village calendar is running now. This is not a placeholder summer.
The second is that the property mix is shifting toward experience in a way that will be visible to residents in September when the ribbon is cut. Restaurants are the new traffic generators, per the operator himself. Boutique fashion is being pulled into a denser, curated footprint. And a wellness club with a first-of-its-kind Miami feature is opening a five-minute walk away.
If you have been thinking about your own position on the island, or wondering how the expansion and The Well change the value of a walk-to-everything address, that is a conversation worth having with someone who has watched this square mile trade for two decades.
Jennifer Brilliant advises sellers and buyers in Bal Harbour, Surfside, Bay Harbor Islands, and Miami Beach with the analytical rigor and Sotheby's global reach these markets require. Let's Connect when you are ready to talk about what any of this means for your home or your next one.
