Ellsworth Place Is Losing Its Chains. Its Third Floor Is Filling Up With Local Cooks.

Ellsworth Place has had a rough year, and several national tenants have left. Up on the third level, Commas reopened last month with a nine-vendor local roster, and one of those vendors is moving in from elsewhere downtown.

For anyone who uses the mall as a weeknight dinner stop, this matters. Commas, the 13,000-square-foot food hall on the third level, held a grand reopening on September 26. It brought back two vendors that had been closed since June, announced a new Ethiopian coffee counter, and lined up a juice bar that is moving over from Cameron Street.

What the mall lost, and why it kept losing

The trouble started with the owner's finances. Source of the Spring reported that GBT Realty Corporation bought Ellsworth Place from Petri Richardson Ventures in 2018 for $92 million, financed with a $69 million loan. GBT fell behind on that loan, and the mall went into special servicing. Store departures made things worse.

The losses in order:

• October 2025: Outback Steakhouse shut its Ellsworth Place location without warning. It was one of nearly two dozen Outback locations that closed at the same time.
• Early 2026: TJ Maxx closed after 10 years downtown, and TD Bank closed its branch.
• June 2026: Two Commas vendors, Tato's and Tokoa Cheesesteaks, closed temporarily while their vendor agreements were finalized under the mall's new ownership.
• 2026: Spinoso Real Estate Group, based in Syracuse, took over leasing and management of the mall under a third-party assignment.

When the new manager arrived, Source of the Spring quoted its press release:

"partnering with ownership and tenants to support performance, reinforcing Ellsworth Place's position within the market, and contribute to the continued success of this important downtown destination."

One plan is now in limbo. In 2024, Montgomery County approved GBT Realty's proposal for a 450-unit residential tower on top of the mall. Source of the Spring describes the status of that plan as unclear.

The mall directory lists Burlington, Dave & Buster's, Michaels, Marshalls, Ross, DSW, Five Below, and Foot Locker. TJ Maxx's old space has a new tenant too. DMV Furniture Outlet opened its second location there in early September, according to The MoCo Show.

Upstairs, the roster kept filling

Commas took a while to get going. It moved into the former F21 Red space, and by late June 2025 four vendors were running in a soft launch. The official grand opening came on September 27 and 28, 2025, after eight vendors had soft-opened over the summer. The lineup has shifted since. 6 Skewers was listed as a Commas vendor in January 2026 but was missing from the nine-vendor roster announced in September.

Here is the September roster:

Kellem Coffee is the newest stall, open since Tuesday, October 13. The MoCo Show reported that owner Chef Bilisee uses beans from Ethiopia's highlands and brews them in the traditional clay jebena. The same report places Kellem among downtown Silver Spring coffee shops such as Kefa Café, Black Lion Café, Sheger Spring Café and Kaldi's Social House.

Nips Juice House shows that the food hall is drawing tenants from elsewhere downtown, too. In August, Nips closed its Cameron Street storefront after five years and announced it would reopen as a stall at Commas. As of the September 24 reopening coverage, its stall was still waiting on permits.

Why this floor kept going while the rest of the mall struggled

Source of the Spring describes Commas as a place for chefs and entrepreneurs who want to build a concept with fewer barriers to entry. Each local vendor runs its own kitchen, so the hall doesn't depend on a single brand. Because of that, losing one tenant leaves a stall empty rather than a whole floor. The September reopening was built around this. Two vendors came back once their agreements were finalized under the new ownership, Kellem Coffee was announced and then opened on October 13, and Nips was on its way from its Cameron Street shop.

The model also has a track record of helping vendors grow. Tato's opened a second location last year at Westfield Montgomery Mall in Bethesda, in the space Chocolate Moonshine and a 7-Eleven used to occupy.

Commas also runs a regular calendar, including Music Party Bingo, Sip & Script, monthly karaoke and a Wellness Market.

Halloween weekend on the third floor

Commas posts these hours: 11 a.m. to 8 p.m. Monday through Thursday, 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Friday and Saturday, and 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. Sunday. Here's what's left on the October calendar:

1. Thursday, October 29: Konpa Happy Hour Dance Class & Social.
2. Friday, October 30: a pre-Halloween urban line dance party.
3. Saturday, October 31: DJ Rell Halloween at C³ Bar.

The week before followed the same pattern, with karaoke on October 27 and a Halloween edition of Music Party Bingo on October 28. November events weren't posted on the Commas events page at press time, so check hellocommas.com before you plan a night around one.

Getting there through November

Veterans Plaza, outside the mall, has its own fall schedule. The FRESHFARM market runs Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at One Veterans Place through December 26. The Silver Spring Downtown 2026 Veterans Plaza guide lists the ice rink as running October through April, and the Thanksgiving Parade is Saturday, November 21. Lunch upstairs after the Saturday market is an easy pairing.

Driving or walking in after dark takes more planning this month. The Purple Line project's updates page lists these overnight closures on Wayne Avenue:

• October 25 through October 30
• November 1 through November 6
• November 8 through November 24

Source of the Spring had reported earlier that the Wayne Avenue and Fenton Street work would happen around late November, so the posted dates could change. The same updates page shows Bonifant Street West closed through December 2026.

The Spring Street Bridge is nearly finished, but it hasn't reopened. It first closed for reconstruction in summer 2024 and was supposed to reopen in January 2025. Crews began about three weeks of overnight painting and other work around October 19, from 7 p.m. to 5 a.m. The Maryland Transit Administration calls the bridge "substantially complete," but the reopening date depends on a list of items still to be finished with Montgomery County. The Purple Line itself is more than 90 percent complete, according to Source of the Spring. Officials still target winter 2027 for service, depending on how safety testing goes.

At Ellsworth Place, the newest arrivals are local operators: an Ethiopian coffee counter, a juice bar from Cameron Street, and two vendors that waited out a change in ownership. If you'd like to know how changes like these affect the value of your own home, Vassar Broermann Group can give you a candid read on your block. Request a free home valuation whenever you're ready.