The dining room at 2210 Fillmore is small. In 2009, The New Fillmore described a menu drawn from French, Armenian and Lebanese traditions: kebabs, filo-dough rolls, Armenian potato salad, French quiche, and a meza platter of eight items that included dolmas, hummus, baba ghanoush and tabbouleh. The same profile said some customers came in for dinner three times a week because the prices were reasonable. Levon Der Bedrossian opened La Méditerranée here in 1979. His son Vanick runs it now, and the two own it together.
In October, La Med signed a lease that keeps it at that address until 2038. Every other new arrival on the 2200 block is still working toward an opening date. La Med is the only business there with a lease that runs into the next decade, and the landlord that once seemed ready to see it go now holds it up as the model for the street.
A new decade on top of a three-year extension
The New Fillmore reported on Oct. 13 that La Med signed a new 10-year lease extension. It sits on top of a three-year extension the restaurant had already signed, so La Med can stay at 2210 Fillmore until 2038. Cody Allen, who works with investor Neil Mehta on the Upper Fillmore Revitalization Project, called with the offer. Vanick Der Bedrossian told the paper the terms were "a manageable set of terms."
"Let's keep it going," he told The New Fillmore.
The deal was first mentioned in public in August, before anything was signed. According to the same New Fillmore story, Fillmore Merchants Association president Tim Omi and District 2 Supervisor Stephen Sherrill raised the possibility at a merchants meeting with both Allen and Der Bedrossian in the room. That explains why the San Francisco Standard's Aug. 14 report still described the lease as running through 2028, with talks on a longer deal underway. The August report and the October signing are two steps in the same process.
How close the block came to losing it
The 2038 date stands out because of where things were two years ago. On Aug. 26, 2024, SFGate reported that Vanick Der Bedrossian had been told in the spring that La Med would not be offered a renewal. He said the lease ended in May 2025. The same day, the San Francisco Chronicle reported that he understood the owners planned a seismic retrofit when the lease ended, followed by a "high-end retail concept" in the space. Allen disputed the retail plan. He told the Chronicle the goal was a wider variety of food-and-beverage operators, and he told SFGate the project had "no interest" in putting a retail tenant in La Med's space.
According to The New Fillmore, then-Supervisor Aaron Peskin held a press conference outside La Med and pushed for a citywide moratorium on evicting legacy businesses. In December 2024, the project announced an extension through the summer of 2028. The New Fillmore reported that the extension came with an understanding that major work would be done on the building after it ran out. Der Bedrossian started looking at other spaces in the neighborhood and considered closing the dining room to run only the catering business.
He told the paper the 20 people on staff are "like a second family," and that letting them go "just didn't feel right."
Who left the 2200 block, and who is moving in
La Med was one of several long-running tenants in buildings the project bought. The Standard reported in 2024 that Mehta had acquired eight Fillmore properties. These are the addresses that matter most on the block now.
| Address | Before | What's planned |
|---|---|---|
| 2210 Fillmore | La Méditerranée, since 1979 | La Méditerranée, with a lease through 2038 |
| 2222 Fillmore | Starbucks, about three decades | Khao Soi Shop, from chef Pim Techamuanvivit |
| 2235 Fillmore | Ten-Ichi, a 46-year Fillmore business | Good Morning 96, from Gizela Ho, aiming for 2027 |
| 2259 Fillmore | Alice + Olivia, 12 years | Bar Oliver, beside the Clay Theater |
| The Clay Theater | Single-screen cinema | Renovated cinema with a café and a small bookstore, aiming for early 2027 |
| 2001 Fillmore | Noosh | A steakhouse from the owners of Ssal |
| 2035–2047 Fillmore | Aquatalia, A-Pizza, Mio | Storefronts combined for a restaurant |
The Chronicle reported in December 2024 that Ten-Ichi closed after its owner could not negotiate a lease. Allen said Starbucks and Alice + Olivia had each turned down offered extensions.
Several of the incoming places are already clearly defined. Good Morning 96 is Gizela Ho's first restaurant after more than a decade cooking at Rich Table. The Standard describes it as a dinner restaurant rooted in California cuisine with global influences. Plans include a mezzanine for private dining, opening up the kitchen that now sits at the back of the narrow space, and an interior that takes cues from the film "In the Mood for Love." Ho plans to put a salted duck egg soufflé on the opening menu, and she has spent months refining a scallop- and shrimp-stuffed chicken wing. Her construction team told her to plan for a midyear opening. Bar Oliver is a New York restaurant and vermouth bar inspired by Basque cooking. Its Fillmore location will add an open hearth and a full bar. At the Clay, the plan won a unanimous endorsement from the Historic Preservation Commission on April 1. The project director told The New Fillmore the team hopes to finish in "early '27."
Ho told the Standard that part of the Upper Fillmore's appeal is that "there's always someone on the street."
The longest commitment on the block belongs to its oldest tenant
In 2024, the worry was that the operator who had been there longest would be replaced by something the landlord preferred. In 2026, that operator holds the latest end date on the block, and every new arrival is still pointing to a season in 2027.
The landlord's own words have changed too. In a written statement to The New Fillmore, Allen said La Med's "independent spirit, dedication and commitment to continual improvement embody our vision for Upper Fillmore's future," and that the project was "thrilled to support them as they approach their sixth decade." The same story reports that Allen admitted at the August meeting that his group had not communicated well with La Med's owners after buying the building. Der Bedrossian called the change "a mutual softening" and said that since the extension he has seen the owners "making some positive changes," including plans to bring back the Clay and "maybe bring in some new concepts."
The project has followed through on two of the commitments people were watching. Omi told the Standard in August that it has kept its promise not to bring in chain stores. At 2035–2047 Fillmore, where the storefronts started emptying in 2022, he welcomed the purchase. "The space has been sitting empty, and it will be amazing to have it start to get worked on," Omi told the Standard.
By 2027, the 2200 block is expected to have a soufflé-and-cocktails dinner room, a Basque hearth, a curry-and-noodle shop and a reopened single-screen cinema, all within a few doors of La Med.
What changes inside La Med, and what doesn't
With the lease settled, the Der Bedrossians have started small upgrades. "We're sprucing up the dining room chunk by chunk," Vanick Der Bedrossian told The New Fillmore, "doing little things and trying to avoid prolonged closure." Regulars should know about a few specifics:
- The restaurant may close for a few days to fix plumbing.
- The rest is cosmetic: "just a fresh coat of paint, maybe refinishing the bar, getting rid of the last vestiges of the covid era."
- Catering makes up about half the restaurant's revenue, so the kitchen serves more than the small dining room.
- The New Fillmore describes Levon Der Bedrossian as "theoretically now retired," but his son says, "He'll never retire. He and I work closely together. He's still around."
Asked about the menu and the room, Vanick Der Bedrossian was direct. "Nothing major is changing."
When a block's most-loved tenant signs on for another decade, the street becomes easier to describe to anyone deciding whether to live near it. If you own near Upper Fillmore and are thinking about how the 2027 openings might shape your timing or your listing story, Amanda Jones Advisory & Associates can walk you through it. Book a private consultation.
