Three Tenderloin businesses — Ruru Kitchen, Deli Shack, and Gateway Croissant — are in line for custom decorative security gates by early October, installed by One Hat One Hand under the Larkin Street Revival, a beautification initiative backed by a $5 million donation from Chris Larsen.

On the 400 block of Larkin Street, two neighboring businesses — Ruru Kitchen at 448 and Deli Shack at 452 — are slated to get custom decorative security gates by early October. So is Gateway Croissant, which anchors the corner of Larkin and Golden Gate Avenue at 390 Golden Gate Ave. The gates are being designed and installed by One Hat One Hand, a San Francisco fabrication shop whose owner, Marcus Guillard, gave Mission Local the early October target.

The work flows through the Larkin Street Revival, a beautification and safety initiative launched with a $5 million donation from Chris Larsen, the cryptocurrency billionaire. The project has already outfitted at least one other Larkin corridor business: Outta Sight Pizza received a gate back in February. Co-owner Eric Ehler told Mission Local he and his partner were open to the installation if it would help the street. "We wanted to do whatever was best for the neighborhood," Ehler said.

The project also subsidizes Live on Larkin, a free outdoor concert series held every second Saturday on Larkin between Eddy and O'Farrell. The next one is August 8, noon to 5 p.m., with a "back to school" theme, food and retail vendors, and a kids' area. Through July, local musicians are playing two-hour sets along Market Street as part of Market Street Arts' Busk It! program, adding to the street-level activity on the corridor.

The gates land on a neighborhood under measurable pressure. The Tenderloin recorded 51 eviction notices in the last 90 days — recent filings include the 0 block of Jones Street, the 600 block of Geary, and the 1000 block of Post Street — and 881 service requests to 311 in the last seven days, per city data.

Of the businesses getting new gates, Ruru Kitchen at 448 Larkin is a newer arrival: owner Francisco Bastidas received a $75,000 city grant for his coffee-and-mocktails concept there, as The Dissent reported in June. Deli Shack at 452 has operated since May 2023 under A&W Inc., per city business records, in a storefront that previously housed Burmese Kitchen and Larkin Express Deli.

Come October, anyone walking that stretch of Larkin will see the change: where there were plain roll-down grilles, there will be fabricated metalwork.