FIFTH-STREET MAKEOVER.

Byline: RETAIL NOTEBOOK By Joe Mosley The Register-Guard

Eugene's original lifestyle mall is undergoing a facelift.

No, not that lifestyle mall. With the city's retail attention riveted to Oakway Center and related developments along Coburg Road over the past few years, its downtown predecessor in the boutique shopping center genre has continued a pattern of quiet evolution and steady growth.

But the Fifth Street Public Market is getting a touch-up for its 30th birthday next summer, and will begin creating a little noise with a partial unveiling this month.

The changed facade on the Market's north side is because of Vaquero - a new Latin-influenced, high-concept restaurant that is expected to play a leading role for the redone shopping venue. Vaquero will be open by Sept. 28.

"Brian Obie (the market's owner) is wanting to inject some new life into the market, and our restaurant is going to be a huge launching pad for that," says Katie Marcus-Brown, who is putting the finishing touches on Vaquero along with business partner Sara Willis.

"It's just catching up," Willis says. "The Fifth Street Market has been here for what, 30 years?"

Obie sees current plans on a little grander scale, with the addition of Vaquero giving the market a one-two fine-dining punch. Marche, a French restaurant on the market's south side, already is a destination point for many restaurantgoers, he says.

The new, north-facing exterior that's being put in place for Vaquero will give the market some flash, with an all-new facade and stainless steel awnings. And work is just beginning on the opposite (south) side of the market, where another new facade with an atrium entry will greet shoppers and diners by next summer.

The south-side remodel is expected to bring in a couple of new tenants, and will include a complete renovation of the ground-floor food area to create what Obie calls "a food hall, in the European tradition." There also will be some updating of storefronts on the courtyard, and the addition of outside heaters and rain covers in the courtyard itself.

"We've got a project ahead of us," says Obie, who expects to spend about $3 million.

None of the upcoming changes are expected to be more dramatic than Vaquero's insertion into the space that previously held the Bamboo restaurant and the Electric Castle Wunderland video arcade.

The interior was completely reconfigured, and the result is a mix of private and semiprivate dining nooks along with a large common bar area.

Willis, who owns a catering business in San Jose del Cabo on Mexico's Baja Peninsula, brought in two workers from Mexico to paint the restaurant's interior and create a colorful stained concrete look on the new sheetrock walls. "We're taking the Latin influences I have down in Mexico, and we're taking the steakhouse and kind of turning it Americana," Willis says. "Think of a bordertown in Texas, in the 1950s."

Think also of a high-end menu.

Prices have not yet been set, but dinner entrees will range from seared rack of lamb with tequila pan drippings to a grilled six-pepper dusted ribeye steak to a jumbo prawn creole.

"There's nothing highfalutin in the (menu) descriptions, but the presentations are just going to knock your socks off," Marcus-Brown says.

Then there's the list of more than 30 tapas - Spanish for appetizers - that include lobster meatballs, fish tacos, baked macaroni and cheese with ham or morels and an artichoke tamale.

The tapas are intended either to accompany entrees - which the owners say will include large portions along with a side dish - or to serve as light meals. They are hoping that these also will appeal to the after-work cocktail crowd or to late, after-theater customers.

Vaquero will open for lunch at 11:30 a.m. each day except Sunday, when its limited brunch menu begins at 10 a.m. It will serve tapas as late as 11 p.m. weekdays and 1 a.m. on weekends.

Marcus-Brown and Willis are playing off the success of their first collaborative restaurant venture: the Red Agave, a few blocks west at Fourth Avenue and Willamette Street. It opened three years ago and has developed something of a cult following.

Brendan Mahaney will serve as executive chef of both restaurants, but otherwise the two restaurants will maintain separate staffs. About 45 to 50 employees are expected to work at Vaquero.

Obie, a former Eugene mayor and businessman with far-flung interests, says Marcus-Brown and Willis are a perfect fit for the eclectic Fifth Street Public Market. They've developed a unique concept and possess the kind of savvy that has typified the market's most successful tenants, he says.

Sales at the market have increased steadily through all of the region's economic ups and downs, he says, and its storefronts are typically about 95 percent full.

"So this is just a little bit of repositioning, is all," Obie says.

Part of that is intended to take advantage of plans to reconfigure the northeast corner of downtown Eugene, drawing the new federal courthouse into the mix by rerouting a portion of Sixth Avenue in a way that is likely to increase the market's exposure.

"That has nothing to do with my brilliance - just luck, I guess," Obie says. "But we want to take advantage of the opportunity that creates, and it's time to refresh and to some extent re-tenant that (southeast) building."

Even with all the changes, he plans to stay with the formula that has worked for the Fifth Street Market since its inception in the mid-1970s, he says.

"It's a Eugene icon, and we respect that a lot," Obie says. "We've got an exceptional cadre of local tenants. That's our real niche, is the local, unique tenant."

Retail Notebook runs on Thursdays. Joe Mosley can be reached at 338-2384 or [e-mail].

CAPTION(S):

Sara Willis (left) and Katie Marcus-Brown are about to open Vaquero, a Latin-influenced restaurant, in the Fifth Street Public Market.