What's New Around Downtown Hickory This Season

If you have lived in Hickory for a while, the downtown you knew five years ago is not the downtown you walk today. The Union Square renovation reset the middle of the map. The $40 million bond referendum reset the edges. And this year, the pieces are starting to touch.

The story behind the new openings

Here is the claim worth sitting with: the new restaurants opening around downtown are not landing at random. They are clustering along a corridor the city is actively stitching together. Hickory City Council approved agreements with NCDOT to receive federal funds to construct a multiuse trail and streetscape improvements along Old Lenoir Road, known as the OLLE Art Walk, a planned multiuse path that will connect multiple sections of the Hickory Trail network being developed under the Crafting Hickory initiative and the $40 million bond referendum passed by Hickory voters, running along Old Lenoir Road to connect the City Walk to the Riverwalk and Aviation Walk segments.

Translation for the daily driver: the piece of town everyone used to cut through to get somewhere else is becoming the somewhere else. In February 2024, Hickory City Council approved a $22,714,090.80 construction contract with Neill Grading and Construction Company for the OLLE Art Walk. That is a lot of concrete pointed at a stretch of Old Lenoir Road that, a decade ago, was mostly warehouses.

The restaurant map is following the trail map. Once you notice it, you can't unnotice it.

The recent openings worth knowing

A quick, honest inventory of what has opened in and around downtown that you may not have tried yet.

North Hickory Market. A new neighborhood restaurant in Hickory's OLLE Arts District, serving breakfast, lunch, dinner, brunch, and drinks, with a goal of fresh, made-from-scratch meals in a community-focused environment. Calvin Reyes, his wife Melissa Reyes, and Jordan Bost opened the doors in October. The name is an homage to the building's history as Hutto's Market and North Hickory Furniture. That building history matters. It is the OLLE Arts District thesis in one sentence: old furniture bones, new kitchen.

Notions. Tapas, shared plates, and unique cocktails, located on the newly renovated Downtown Square in Hickory at 206 Union Sq NW. If your last downtown night out was steak-and-a-bourbon, this is a different rhythm.

Plant Based Boss. Owners Issa and Ashley Geran opened Plant Based Boss in its new location on Second Avenue NW in downtown Hickory on May 24. The relocation moves an established local concept squarely into the downtown foot traffic.

Hart & Soul of Hickory. Rob and Theresa Hart's restaurant serves affordable comfort food with a modern twist. The Hart & Soul omelette and sausage gravy get particular attention. A weekend breakfast that is not a chain.

Hatch Sandwich Bar. Already on the short list of downtown lunches, and one of the names that keeps surfacing on the local best-of updates from earlier this year.

Waterbean Coffee's downtown expansion. The latest concept from the owners of Nagano Japanese Restaurant, with founder Lynn Nguyen passing the business down to her daughter Annie Lam and son-in-law Tony Vo, who also owns Waterbean Coffee. Which brings us to the biggest project on the horizon.

The Hickory Food Hall, in plain terms

You have probably driven past the old First National Bank building at First Avenue and Second Street NW and wondered what is happening inside. Here is where things stand.

The 23,000-square-foot former First National Bank building in downtown Hickory is being turned into a food hall.

There will be space for 14 food and retail vendors in total. Waterbean Coffee is the first vendor announced so far. Tony Vo has said his family's purpose is for the Hickory Food Hall to serve as a small business incubator for art, food and other vendors.

The point for a resident is not the square footage. It is that a 23,000-square-foot lunch destination is arriving in a downtown that, according to local operators, currently lacks sufficient dining options that cater to professionals within walking distance during lunch breaks, where traditional sit-down restaurants often prove impractical given the limited time available, making grab-and-go dining a convenient solution for workers seeking quick, satisfying meals within walking distance. If you work anywhere near Union Square, your lunch options are about to double.

The OLLE Arts District is more than a name

The corridor the trail is following already has tenants worth knowing.

Over the past several years, the Old Lenoir Road area in Hickory has been transforming into a budding arts community known as the OLLE Arts District, driven by the artists and creatives who own studios and businesses in the area, with annual events and planning for the City of Hickory's OLLE Art Walk. The people involved include Dana Andreasson and the potters at Mud Mamas Studio, Charles Kimso at African Heritage USA, Hunter Speagle at ATAC Galleries, Meredith and JD Ross of The Hickory Tree, THE ART MILL, Dale Helton, and Lana Bailey at Vintage Blue.

The Spring Market at Mud Mamas has become a genuine anchor event on that end of town. If you have not walked the district on a Saturday, that is the low-lift way to see what the trail buildout is aiming at.

Once the path is done, the OLLE Art Walk will run along Old Lenoir Road to connect the City Walk to the Riverwalk and Aviation Walk segments of the Hickory Trail. You will be able to walk from Union Square to the river without getting in the car. That is the shift.

Mark the calendar

The city and HDDA have already published the 2026 downtown calendar. A few dates worth clearing space for:

A few things about that calendar that only make sense if you live here.

The Fall Art Crawl is not a small affair. The Downtown Hickory Art Crawl boasts the works of more than 60 artists along with music, all in an easily walkable four block area, with the artwork for sale to support local artists, the Children's Entrepreneur Market returning, and Western Piedmont Symphony's Side Show and Hickory Ballet & Performing Arts performing at various locations. If you have out-of-town guests in mid-September, this is the answer.

Oktoberfest is the one non-negotiable on the list. Hickory's Oktoberfest 2026 will be held October 9, 10 and 11 in Downtown Hickory, celebrating its 39th year. The German connection is not marketing. Hickory was co-founded by a German, Adolphus "Dolph" Shuford, is home to the United States headquarters for several German companies, and is a sister city with Altenburg, Germany.

What all of this means for a Saturday

Zoom out and the pieces line up.

You have a walkable four-block downtown that keeps adding scratch kitchens and tapas concepts. You have a 23,000-square-foot food hall about to open a block off Union Square. You have a 2.4-mile art walk being built along Old Lenoir Road that will connect downtown to the river. And you have an arts district full of working studios, not just a mural or two.

A Saturday that used to mean one lunch stop and a drive home now supports a full loop: breakfast bagels at North Hickory Market, a walk through the OLLE studios, tapas at Notions on Union Square, and a movie on the lawn if the date lines up. The Hickory Trail is a 10-foot-wide walking and biking path that connects neighborhoods with downtown Hickory, currently spanning 10 miles and including City Walk, Riverwalk, Aviation Walk, Historic Ridgeview Walk, and OLLE Art Walk.

That is the quiet upgrade to daily life here. Not a single grand opening. A network.

Let's Connect

If you love what Hickory is becoming and you have started wondering how your street, your block, or your future block fits into that map, that is a conversation worth having. Reach out to Kelsie Blevins and let's talk about what is happening in your corner of the Catawba Valley.