Power & Light Is Building a Daytime, and It Starts at 1360 Main

On Wednesday, October 7, people were lined up for coffee at 1360 Main St. in the Kansas City Power & Light District. That day Paris Baguette opened its downtown café in a storefront that had sat waiting for a tenant for a long time. The Kansas City Star ran a photo of the line under the headline about the opening.

Most people who know the district know it for watch parties, the KC Live! block, and late nights on Grand Boulevard. Over the past year, the newest arrivals around Main, Walnut and 14th have been a bakery, a sauna studio, a smoothie counter, a brunch patio, and soon a bookstore. The district's leadership says this is on purpose. The small daytime shops are also showing up faster than the large projects one block south.

The storefront that waited

The 1360 Main St. space was first announced as a flagship for Three Dog Bakery, the pet treat retailer, but that project never fully materialized. Paris Baguette took the space instead. Kari and Sandeep Khandelwal own and operate it as franchisees. They already run the Paris Baguette at 15895 Metcalf Ave. in Overland Park. The Star counts the downtown café as the brand's third Kansas City location.

The format is built for quick, frequent visits. You pick up a tray and wax paper, choose your pastries from the cases, and pay at the register. The menu includes croissants, sandwiches made in-house every day, salads, and coffee. For October, the Star listed seasonal items such as a vanilla scream ghost cake, spider mochi donuts and caramel apple streusel tarts.

When the café was announced in March, district president John Moncke explained the thinking to Startland News. "We are very deliberate about curating the downtown experience," he said, "and we are focused on building a walkable neighborhood with the right mix of everyday amenities." He also said the bakery would serve "residents, office workers, and visitors," and he named residents first.

What the daytime block looks like now

Taken one at a time, each opening looks small. Put on a map, they fill a few blocks with places you can visit before the evening crowd arrives.

The sources list SWTHZ at two addresses. The studio's own booking page gives 101 W. 13th St., and the district's directory lists 1300 Baltimore Ave. FOX4 reported in March that the studio planned to open Friday, March 13, 2026.

The Cordish Companies named Tropical Smoothie Cafe and Besos y Abrazos at 1323 Walnut among the district's recent openings in its October 2025 announcement for the 10th anniversary of One Light. All of these sit within a few minutes' walk of each other between 13th and 14th Streets.

The bookstore's moving date

The store with the most local roots is still under construction. Made In KC, the local gift shop brand, is opening at 161 E. 14th St. with Rainy Day Books, the city's oldest independent bookstore. According to the Star, Made In KC's owners already hold part of Rainy Day's ownership, alongside a group of longtime customers called the Friends of Rainy Day Books. This will be Made In KC's 12th location, and its Made In KC Café and Bar is close by at 1114 Baltimore Ave.

The opening date has moved later. Shelf Awareness reported an "early October" target on August 25. By October 5, Joyce Smith's KCinsiders openings list still showed the shop as "Coming Soon" and gave the target as "By the end of the month." Rainy Day's own announcement promised "all of the best books and local goods to the heart of the city." When the Star contacted Made In KC, the company said only to "stay tuned."

A few weeks' delay is normal for a retail build-out. With the bookstore open, the 1300 block of Main and the 14th Street frontage would have three daytime anchors within a short walk: coffee, books and a sauna.

Who the district is building for

Cordish counted about 2,000 people living in the district's four residential buildings in October 2025, with more than 50 businesses. The Downtown Council put downtown's residential population above 33,000 as of January 2026.

The district's own towers house roughly one in sixteen downtown residents. A watch party can fill a plaza with visitors from across the metro on a Sunday. A bakery or a bookstore needs regular weekday customers. To get them, these shops have to attract the other 31,000 or so people who live downtown, plus office workers from the surrounding blocks. That matches the three groups Moncke named. Our Power & Light neighborhood page and our look at HOA fees and amenities in the district's condos cover the residential side of the district in more detail.

1400 Main is still dark

One block from the new bakery, the largest building on this stretch has had no tenant since the spring. B&B Theatres closed the historic Mainstreet Theater at 1400 Main St. effective immediately at the beginning of March. KCUR reported that Cordish still owned the building when the theater closed. No new operator or temporary use has been announced since then.

The parking lot next to the theater is where Four Light is supposed to go. Early plans call for a 25-story tower with 293 apartments and 17,000 square feet of retail, and the city has moved to open up local incentives for it. In its July 2026 follow-up, the Star reported that the project still had no construction start date and quoted a Cordish official saying there were no updates. The same story noted that Missouri revived its MODESA program in 2026, which could support a larger district expansion that Blake Cordish has tied to a proposed $2.5 billion investment in Missouri. Neither the Star nor KCUR has linked that proposal to the theater building.

The Residence, an upscale cocktail lounge planned for 1380 Main St., between the bakery and the theater, is also still waiting. The Star reported in April that it would open "this fall." As of mid-October, the district's listing still says "Coming soon" and gives no date.

A few blocks south, the Royals have outlined a $3 billion stadium and ballpark district at Crown Center, funded with $1 billion in public money and $2 billion in private money, as Startland's October 9 downtown development roundup describes it. That plan sits outside the district, and so far no announcement has connected it to 1400 Main.

So on the Main Street side of the district, the small storefronts are filling in while the tower, the theater and the lounge stay on hold.

The rest of the season on the block

The evening calendar is as full as usual. The district's own listings give these dates:

1. Now through October 16: Streetcar Link buses replace streetcar service between the Riverfront and Union Station during track repairs. Service between Union Station and UMKC runs normally.
2. Through October 17: Free local live music at KC Live! on weekends, with happy hour from 5 p.m. at The Pendergast Bar.
3. October 15: Reservations open for Tinsel Tavern, the holiday pop-up inside Guy Fieri's Dive and Taco Joint at 1333 Grand Blvd.
4. October 18 and October 25: Chiefs watch parties at KC Live! against Los Angeles and then Seattle. The October 25 listing says admission is free, the event is 21 and older, and the game is shown on a 40-foot screen.
5. October 31: The End of Days Halloween party with DJ Travisty and a $10,000 costume contest.
6. November 26: Tinsel Tavern opens.

If the bookstore hits its latest target, it will open in the same weeks as the last two Chiefs watch parties of October.

At Locate KC, we follow which Power & Light storefronts open and which stay dark, because what fills the ground floor shapes the blocks around every downtown condo. If you own in One Light, Two Light or the nearby lofts and want to know how this fall's openings could affect your home's value, ask us for a free home valuation and we'll go through it block by block.