Waiānuenue at Kapaʻakea: New Restaurants at the Foot of Mānoa

On September 15, Kamehameha Schools held a blessing with oli and pule at the corner of University Avenue and South Beretania Street. That's the block many people still call the Varsity Center. Community leaders and neighbors came, along with representatives from three of the businesses moving in: Morning Brew, Local Boy Sushi and OAKBERRY. New artwork by Koloikeao Anthony, Solomon Enos and Colleen "TUTUVI" Kimura now runs through the property. It draws on the moʻolelo of the area's water and landscapes.

The blessing marked the end of the renovations. The stores come later. Pacific Business News reported that the businesses will open at different times through next summer. If you drive down University Avenue every day from Mānoa, the new retail campus, called Waiānuenue at Kapaʻakea, won't open all at once. It will fill in counter by counter over roughly the next nine months. The order matters if you're waiting on one particular place.

Land the center itself traces back to Mānoa

Waiānuenue sits in Mōʻiliʻili, but the center's own fact sheet places it in the ʻili of Kapaʻakea, Waikīkī Ahupuaʻa. It also notes that the land was formerly part of Mānoa Ahupuaʻa. The name points back up the valley too. Waiānuenue refers to the shimmering rainbows over Mānoa.

The site is about 1.5 acres, with roughly 20,000 square feet of commercial leasing space. That makes it a neighborhood-scale retail block. It's not a mall. At the blessing, Calvin Mann, director of planning and development at Kamehameha Schools, described the goal in a statement on the Waiānuenue news page:

"As Waiānuenue ma Kapaʻakea opens, we aim to create a place that respects its history while offering opportunities for the community to gather, connect and engage in meaningful ways."

The center also has a virtual experience that shows visitors the land as it looked in earlier times.

What stood on this block before

To anyone who has lived in Mānoa a while, the corner held a familiar set of businesses. Honolulu Magazine lists Blazin' Steaks, Kit n Kitchen and Smokey's Pipe and Coffee as past tenants of the Varsity Center complex. Rock Bottom Sports Bar & Grill was at 2535 Coyne Street.

Kamehameha Schools announced the project in June 2023. It covered the Varsity Center, the East-West Building, 2535 Coyne Street and the parking lots around them. Groundbreaking was planned for summer 2024, with the opening set for 2026. The 2026 target held, at least for finishing the renovations. The same announcement called Waiānuenue the first phase of a larger Kapaʻakea redevelopment. The long-term plan is a commercial and residential community. The current materials describe only a retail campus. They don't give a unit count, rents or a timeline for any housing. So the staggered openings this year are the first piece of a longer project at this corner.

The first counter: OAKBERRY at 1010 University Avenue

Kamehameha Schools had expected OAKBERRY to be the first tenant. Its July estimate said late September or early October. The açaí shop then named a date. Aloha State Daily reported on September 25 that OAKBERRY would open at 1010 University Ave. at 10 a.m. on September 26. The first 100 customers would get free bowls, and everyone else would get 50% off for the rest of opening day.

That article came out before the opening. As of October 12, we haven't found any dated coverage confirming how opening day went. So treat September 26 as the announced start of the rollout, and check the shop before you go.

The rest of the roster, and what's known about each

Commercial real estate firm Colliers announced the food-and-drink lineup in July. It said tenants would open in "late 2026." KHON2 reported the same month that shops were expected to start opening at the end of the year. Pacific Business News later stretched that window through next summer. Here's where each name stands based on published reporting:

The two names at the blessing, Morning Brew and Local Boy Sushi, are the only other tenants with any public sign of progress so far. Ten announced tenants have no published date. That's a big reason the "through next summer" estimate seems realistic.

Parking is shared across the district, including Puck's Alley

The Shaka Shaka Tea move ties the new campus to the older one across the street. The tea shop is relocating from Puck's Alley to Waiānuenue. Kamehameha Schools runs the area as a single district. Its Kapaʻakea District FAQ says district-wide parking is available at Waiānuenue, the Varsity Building and Puck's Alley. It also mentions walkable streets, bike connections and transit access.

For now, that district FAQ is the clearest published guide to parking at the new block.

This week's detour at the bottom of University Avenue

Getting to the new block takes a little more planning this week. The Hawaiʻi Department of Transportation's Oʻahu roadwork schedule lists full closures of the University Avenue eastbound H-1 on-ramp and off-ramp. They run nightly from 11:30 p.m. to 7:30 a.m., Sunday, Oct. 11 through Thursday, Oct. 15, for guardrail upgrades. The on-ramp detour uses Old Waialae Road, and the off-ramp detour uses Bingham Street. HDOT notes that the schedule depends on weather and may change without notice. The closures only cover overnight hours, so daytime trips past the corner aren't affected. Late-night drives home into the valley are.

Fall dates up the valley while the counters fill in

The schedule at the bottom of University Avenue is still open-ended. Up the valley, the fall calendar is already set. These dates fall within the same months Waiānuenue's first tenants are expected to open:

• Oct. 26, 9:30–11:30 a.m. A guided "nature bathing" walk at Lyon Arboretum.
• Oct. 30, 9:30–11:30 a.m. Lyon's moss-and-air-plant wall-art workshop, which is already sold out with a waitlist.
• Nov. 9, 10 a.m. Parking reservations open for Lyon Arboretum's Fall Plant & Craft Sale.
• Dec. 4–5, 9 a.m.–3 p.m. each day. The Fall Plant & Craft Sale itself, set up around the Visitor Center and Greenhouse. Walk-ups are welcome from 10:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m.
• Through Dec. 21. "The Ocean that Remembers," a free public exhibit at the Hamilton Library Bridge Gallery, 2550 McCarthy Mall on the UH Mānoa campus.

As of today, Waiānuenue's news page has no posts newer than September 24, and it lists no October through December events. Updates on the next openings will most likely come from the tenants themselves and local outlets like Aloha State Daily and KHON2, both of which covered the July lineup. By the plant sale weekend in early December, the late-2026 window from Colliers and KHON2 will be nearly up. That should show whether a second or third counter has opened at the corner of University and Beretania.

We'll be following the Waiānuenue openings as they happen, along with everything else that changes on Mānoa's stretch of University Avenue. If you're thinking about what a new front door at the foot of the valley means for your own move, Hawaii Home Group is glad to walk you through Mānoa street by street. Start your Oʻahu move. Let's find your Hawaii home.