If you have lived here more than a year, you already know the standard beats. Linger's patio, Little Man's line, El Five's sunset. That is not what this summer is about. The interesting movement in the Highlands right now is smaller and more geographic than most guides will admit: the neighborhood has effectively split into two operator-driven strips, and the walk between them is doing more work than either one alone.
The thesis, if you want it in a sentence: the center of gravity used to be a single mile of West 32nd Avenue. In summer 2026 it is a triangle — 32nd Avenue between Julian and Lowell, the Tennyson block between 39th and 43rd, and the Sunday market that stitches them into one afternoon.
The 32nd Avenue Stretch Got Tighter, Not Bigger
Look at what has actually opened on 32nd in the last four months and the pattern is small footprints, operator names on the door, and reasons to walk rather than drive.
Paperboy took the space at 3940 W. 32nd Ave and opened on March 24. It is the Austin brunch group's first location outside Texas, roughly 3,000 square feet with a patio, serving Texas hash, migas, brown-butter pancakes, and rotating seasonal Pop-Tarts. The reason it matters is not the migas. It is the fact that an Austin operator with two locations and a real following chose a mid-block spot on 32nd instead of a bigger, more visible Denver corridor. That is a read on the neighborhood.
A few blocks east, Good Kid Collective moved into 32nd Avenue in West Highland last November after Gabby Smith and Andrew Teegarden partnered with Sammy Naser and Marina Bueno, who previously ran Omni Thrift and Omni Fem. The store is a '90s time capsule with a working Nintendo 64 in the back and a Zenith TV playing VHS upstairs. It is worth going in even if you do not buy anything, because it is the kind of small resale-driven retail that the strip has been missing since a few of the older shops turned over.
Cerebral Brewing's new Highlands taproom quietly slotted in as well and now anchors the Lowell end for anyone who wants to close the Sunday market with a pint on a patio instead of another coffee.
Tennyson Is Doing Something Different
Tennyson between 39th and 43rd is not competing with 32nd. It is playing an older, weirder game.
American Lore opened at 3965 Tennyson as a saloon-style whiskey bar with an in-house hat workshop run by Hats by Parker Thomas, in partnership with Number Thirty Eight from north Denver. The hat process runs about half an hour and up: pick the material, crown shape, brim, band, feathers, then walk out with the thing on your head. Reservations are recommended but they take walk-ins. Whether you want a hat or not, it is the most genuinely unusual room to open on this side of town in a year.
Bao Brewhouse is building out a second location at 3973 Tennyson under Michael Swift and chef Joe Bracero. Watch for it this summer. It will land next to High Point Creamery and around the corner from the Salty Donut, which pushes that specific block toward being the densest food stretch on Tennyson.
Funky Buddha, the Nepali-forward kitchen from Pemba Sherpa and Bhagya Gurung that opened in late 2024, added a proper patio for this season. The menu leans Nepali but pulls from China, Korea, and Malaysia, and it is one of the few places up here where you can eat outside without being packed shoulder to shoulder.
If a friend from out of town asks where to go, the honest answer in July 2026 is not a single restaurant. It is a route: coffee on 32nd, market at Lowell, drive or long walk up to Tennyson for dinner and a hat.
The Sunday That Ties It Together
The Highlands Farmers Market runs Sundays 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. through October 25, on 32nd Avenue between Julian and Newton in Highland Square. It has live music, a market bar for actual cocktails, and dogs are welcome. Most residents already know this. What most residents underuse is what to do with the two hours before and after.
A workable Sunday, in order:
- 8:30 a.m. Coffee somewhere on 32nd before the market crowd. Paperboy handles it if you want food attached. Otherwise your usual counter.
- 9:15 a.m. Enter the market at the Julian end, walk east toward Lowell. Produce and flowers early; you want the good stuff before 10.
- 10:45 a.m. Cerebral or the market bar for one drink on a bench.
- 11:30 a.m. Walk south on Lowell through Highlands Square. This is the part most people skip. The Sunday retail hours are the calmest they get.
- 12:30 p.m. Loop back to your car or to lunch. If lunch, Highland Tap & Burger for the reliable version, or hold out for a Tennyson dinner.
- Late afternoon. Drive or Uber to Tennyson between 39th and 43rd for American Lore, Bao Brewhouse when it opens, or the Funky Buddha patio.
The one-mile 32nd Ave loop from Bryant to Lowell and back down through the Square takes about as long as you want it to. Treat the drive to Tennyson as a separate act rather than an extension, and the day works. Try to walk between the two and you will lose ninety minutes.
What Just Happened, and What Is Next
The Tennyson Street Fair closed on Saturday. Attendance grew from 15,000 in year one to 30,000 in 2025, and the 2026 edition ran July 17–18 with a Wax Trax Records DJ pop-up, pickleball courts, a pre-fest run club, and the Berkeley Beer Festival on Friday night featuring 18 breweries including Wibby, Westbound & Down, 4 Noses, Cerebral, Outer Range, and Alley Brews. Punchcards ran $25 in advance and $30 at the door.
The reason to mention it now, on the Sunday after, is that the businesses along Tennyson tend to keep the momentum for two or three weekends. Patios stay full through early August. New arrivals get their busiest days of the year in the seven days following the fair. If you have been putting off checking out American Lore or the Funky Buddha patio, this is the window where they are worth going to on a Tuesday instead of a Saturday.
Looking ahead, the Highland Square Harvest Festival closes the farmers market season on October 25. That is the next neighborhood-wide moment worth putting on the calendar. Between now and then, expect the Bao Brewhouse open, the Cerebral patio in full run, and the market rotating through Palisade peaches once late August hits.
What the Older Guides Still Miss
A few things residents ask about that keep showing up incorrectly on other sites:
- Masterpiece Delicatessen is closed. Chef-owner Justin Brunson pivoted to River Bear American Meats. It still appears in older lists.
- Argyll Whisky Beer never survived past 2016 and was not actually in the Highlands to begin with. You can stop searching for it.
- Wendell's on Tennyson faced eviction earlier this year and stayed open through community fundraising. It is worth stopping in specifically because that outcome was not guaranteed.
- The Highlands Farmers Market is on 32nd between Julian and Newton, not at 32nd and Tejon. Tejon is the LoHi Bazaar block, which is a different event entirely.
The Real Reading
The interesting thing about the Highlands this summer is not any one opening. It is that the neighborhood has, without a plan, reorganized itself around small operators taking short leases in specific micro-blocks. Paperboy chose a mid-block 32nd spot instead of a corner. American Lore paired a bar with a hat shop instead of doing either alone. Good Kid Collective is four people running a store together instead of a franchise. Bao Brewhouse is opening a second location a mile from its first rather than reaching across the city.
That pattern is what makes living here feel different from living in a comparable Denver neighborhood right now. The businesses are legible. The operators are named. The walks connect.
If you are thinking about what your block will look like in a year, or if a next move in the neighborhood is on your mind for reasons that have nothing to do with a Sunday market, reach out to Nick Bruce and schedule a consultation. The read on the street is the same read that shapes how a home here should be priced, prepared, and shown.
