Drive down Mills Drive past Kendall Drive this month and the plaza looks almost normal again. The chain-link is gone from the old Publix pad. There's a new marquee where Bolay used to be. If you haven't been paying close attention, it would be easy to assume a mall just got a facelift. Look at who actually signed the leases, though, and a different story shows up: the businesses filling these spaces aren't outsiders discovering Kendall. Several of them are people who grew up two miles from here, coming back to open their first real storefront in the neighborhood that made them.
That distinction matters if you live here, because it changes what these openings actually mean for your week.
What Changed at the Palms in Under a Year
The turnover at the Palms at Town & Country has been fast enough that it's worth laying out plainly.
| What Opened | What It Replaced or Where | When |
|---|---|---|
| Starbucks | A former Burger King | Opened October 2025 |
| Barnes & Noble | Replaced a larger, older store a mile away at Kendall Village | Opened October 2025 |
| Cava | The space Bolay left behind | Opened mid-April 2026 |
| Pura Vida Miami | New 3,425-square-foot space near J.Crew Factory | Slated for this summer |
| Yoga Joint | 5,360-square-foot studio next to J.Crew Factory | Slated for this summer |
| New Publix | Replacing the 40-year-old store demolished after closing in January 2026 | Under construction |
Six changes to one shopping center inside roughly ten months is not the normal pace of retail turnover. Kimco Realty, which owns the Palms, has been direct about the strategy. Katie Wycoff, the company's director of real estate, said the goal is "introducing brands that complement the existing mix" as the center keeps building momentum. Read the tenant list and the complementing is obvious: a bookstore and a coffee shop, then a Mediterranean fast-casual chain, then a yoga studio and a smoothie-and-bowl café right next to it. That's not a random backfill. It's a plaza being built around a daily routine, not just a Saturday errand run.
The Cava Counterexample
Cava is the piece of this story that looks like the familiar version. It's a Washington, D.C.-based chain that went public in 2023 and now runs more than 400 locations nationally. Its Kendall opening in mid-April 2026 was its fifth South Florida outpost, following stops in Hialeah, Plantation, Brickell, and Aventura. Chains expand into growing suburbs. That part isn't news.
What's more interesting is what moved in around it. Kendall didn't just get a national brand backfilling a vacancy. It got two homegrown concepts opening blocks away, on their own terms, at roughly the same time.
Kung Fu Chicken Is Coming Home
Kung Fu Chicken is expected to open its fourth South Florida location this fall at 12536 SW 88th Street, a few minutes from the Palms. The founders, Chef Yu Bi and her husband Dr. Tingjun Lei, met while studying hospitality at Florida International University before opening 107 Taste in 2016 and Cajun Boil in 2018. Their fast-casual concept draws on the flavors of Yu Bi's upbringing in Sichuan, built around Taiwanese-style fried chicken, popcorn chicken, and bubble tea.
Chef Yu Bi has said the Kendall opening feels personal because the neighborhood is tied to where their Miami story started. That's a different kind of expansion logic than a corporate real estate team picking a trade area off a spreadsheet. The roughly 1,200-square-foot space will seat 30 guests and run Wednesday through Monday from 11:30 a.m. to 10:30 p.m., closed Tuesdays, with on-site parking. If you're planning a fried chicken run on a Tuesday night, you'll want a backup plan.
The Burger Joint That Started as a Tuesday Pop-Up
Lala's Burgers, which opened at 13750 SW 88th Street in the former Fujiya space around the end of 2025, has an even more local origin story. It began as a Tuesday-only pop-up inside Apocalypse BBQ, the barbecue spot Jeff and Laura "Lala" Budnechky launched from their backyard in 2020 before opening a 43-seat brick-and-mortar location in 2022 and expanding it to 190 seats at Kendall Village Shopping Center in March 2025. Demand for the burger pop-up eventually outgrew the Tuesday slot, and Lala's Burgers became its own 70-seat standalone restaurant.
The beer list is where the local roots show up most clearly. Instead of leaning on national domestics, the taps highlight South Florida breweries: Everhaze IPA from Tripping Animals, La Playita from The Tank Brewing Co., La Rubia from Wynwood Brewing Company, plus harder-to-find pours from Lost City Brewing and Rocketeer Brewing. The Budnechkys have said they're building out a vinyl listening section and board and table games in the coming weeks, positioning the space as a neighborhood hangout rather than a quick-turn fast-casual stop.
Between Kung Fu Chicken and Lala's Burgers, Kendall is getting two new full-service restaurants from operators who either trained locally or built their first concept in the same zip code. That's worth noticing next to a national chain landing in the same six-month window. The corridor isn't being discovered from the outside so much as claimed from the inside.
Why the Publix Parking Lot Has Been a Mess
If you've been avoiding the Palms because the parking has felt like a maze, there's a concrete reason. The Publix that anchored the center for 40 years closed in January 2026, and by mid-April the building was fully demolished to make way for a larger, more contemporary supermarket. Combine that with the Cava opening drawing lines that reportedly ran past 30 minutes at peak times this spring, and the lot has genuinely been more congested than usual. That should ease as the new Publix construction wraps and traffic patterns settle, but there's no public timeline yet for when the new store opens its doors.
What This Actually Means If You're Already Here
None of this changes property values or gives you a reason to think about moving. That's not the point. What it does change is the shape of an ordinary week in Kendall. A Saturday morning yoga class at Yoga Joint followed by a bowl at Pura Vida Miami is now a five-minute walk instead of a drive to South Miami. A Wednesday night burger with a local IPA doesn't require crossing US-1. Fried chicken cutlets and bubble tea, six days a week, minus Tuesdays, are landing walking distance from wherever you already run errands.
The bigger pattern is the one worth sitting with. A shopping center that spent years defined by whichever national retailer needed a box to fill is now attracting concepts built by people with a real stake in the neighborhood, alongside the chains that still make economic sense for a plaza this size. That mix, homegrown restaurants next to a national fast-casual brand, next to a bookstore replacing an older bookstore a mile away, is a more accurate read on where Kendall is right now than any single opening on its own.
If you've lived here for years, you already know this stretch of Kendall Drive has a way of reinventing itself every decade or so without losing what made people plant roots here in the first place. This latest round just happens to be run, in part, by people who grew up watching the last one happen.
If you're curious what else is shifting block by block in the neighborhoods Miami-Dade calls home, whether that's Kendall or somewhere else on your radar, the team at One Trust Realty keeps a close eye on this kind of local change. When the time comes to talk about what's next for your own address, reach out to schedule a consultation.
