For most of the last two decades, if you lived at Mission Hills and someone asked where the good new place was, you pointed south to The River or east down Highway 111. That map is quietly being redrawn this fall. The action is moving north, toward Monterey Avenue and Frank Sinatra Drive, and the club sits almost exactly at the hinge point between the old dining corridor and the new one.
This post is a short field guide to the openings and returns you can actually put on your calendar between now and next spring, arranged by where they sit relative to your front gate.
The new center of gravity is a lagoon
The most consequential change in Rancho Mirage this year is not a restaurant. It is a 24-acre body of water. Cotino, the first Storyliving by Disney community, is finishing the public-facing half of its build. The Artisan Club and the lagoon itself are already in use by the earliest residents. The piece that matters for the rest of us is the town center, called Cotino Bay Beach, Dining and Shops, which is scheduled to open to the public in fall 2026.
The location is worth committing to memory because it changes how you drive to dinner. The town center sits off Monterey Avenue between Gerald Ford and Frank Sinatra Drives, with 45,000 square feet of shopping, dining and entertainment space in its first phase. From the Mission Hills gate on Dinah Shore, you are looking at a short trip north on Monterey rather than the usual run down Bob Hope to 111. The lagoon uses Crystal Lagoons technology to keep the water clear and temperature-balanced, and day passes to Cotino Bay Beach will be sold to non-residents through the town center once it opens.
The four tenants that anchor the first phase
Disney has named its opening lineup, and it is a deliberately mixed set rather than a food court. Four tenants make up the first wave:
- Elevare is the marquee restaurant, an 8,000-square-foot waterfront room serving American cuisine with views across Cotino Bay to the San Jacinto Mountains. It is being operated by Oak View Group with interiors by Ignisio Studios.
- Artigiano is bringing its first United States cafe to Rancho Mirage. The Canadian specialty coffee brand is taking 3,000 square feet and pouring 100 percent Arabica blends in a European-styled room.
- On the Mark Fine Foods & Provisions is a familiar name for anyone who shops in Palm Springs. The second location will be 3,700 square feet, more than twice the original store, with artisan groceries, wines, craft beers and made-to-order sandwiches, plus produce and meat on the plan.
- Khaga Yoga is opening a 2,000-square-foot studio with two rooms, a retail boutique, and family and kids' classes on the schedule.
More tenants are expected to be announced in the run-up to the fall opening. What is already clear is the shape of the offer: a market you can stock a kitchen from, a coffee you can meet a friend at, a studio you can use three mornings a week, and a Saturday-night restaurant. In other words, a town center that gives residents a reason to come back six days out of seven rather than once.
The Highway 111 corridor is not conceding
While Cotino is pulling attention north, the older Rancho Mirage dining spine is answering with its own openings.
At the Omni Rancho Las Palmas Resort & Spa on Bob Hope Drive, a five-minute drive from Mission Hills, executive chef Jose Lopez has opened Double Date, a California-Italian dinner concept that leans into the Coachella Valley's identity as the country's date-growing capital. The menu runs from a campanelle al limone with asparagus and roasted tomatoes to a 14-ounce prime New York strip with gorgonzola and a sticky date cake finished with caramel walnuts and mascarpone. Service is nightly from 5 to 10 p.m., with live music in the plaza five nights a week from Wednesday through Sunday.
Down at the corner of Highway 111 and Bob Hope, the long-empty former Roy's Hawaiian Fusion building at 71959 CA-111 is showing new life. More than a dozen construction documents have been filed for the site, and the paperwork describes converting the existing shell into a 9,260-square-foot full-service fine-dining restaurant with a 275-seat count and a 316-person occupancy cap. The applicant is The Capital Grille. The project is in the bidding phase, and the parent company has declined to confirm the location until entitlements clear, which is standard. Worth watching.
A little further east at Rancho Mirage Marketplace, Keke's Breakfast Cafe is preparing its second Coachella Valley outpost. The Florida-born chain, which is opening a La Quinta location in the former IHOP shell, is targeting a 2026 debut in Rancho Mirage without a firm date yet. If you have driven past the Marketplace this summer wondering what was going into the corner space, that is your answer.
Why the geography matters from your front gate
Drive-times from the Mission Hills gate off Dinah Shore Drive tell the story better than any map:
Omni Rancho Las Palmas is roughly one traffic light away. The Cotino town center site sits about the same distance in the opposite direction, up Monterey. The 71959 CA-111 site is a straight shot down Bob Hope. Mission Hills residents are the only sizable community sitting at the geographic middle of all three.
That is the piece that changes daily life. For years, dinner in Rancho Mirage meant choosing between The River and El Paseo. Starting this fall, the practical choice for a Wednesday night includes a lagoon-side American room, a resort restaurant built around local dates, and a fine-dining conversion at the corner where you already turn for the freeway. None of them existed in this configuration when most Mission Hills owners bought their homes.
The one date to circle for spring
Some traditions are staying put. The Galleri Classic, the PGA TOUR Champions event that has been at Mission Hills since 2023, will return to the Dinah Shore Tournament Course in spring 2027. The tournament plays 54 holes of stroke play on the Desmond Muirhead layout that opened in 1970 and hosted the Chevron Championship before that major relocated. If you have not walked the back nine during tournament week yet, this is a reasonable year to try it. The gallery is loose, the players are accessible, and the vantage from the 18th island green is still one of the best free seats in professional golf.
A shortlist for the next 90 days
If you want to make the fall count without overthinking it, five entries cover the map:
- Book a Wednesday dinner at Double Date at the Omni and take the plaza music as your after-dinner walk.
- Watch the Cotino Bay Beach, Dining and Shops opening announcements. When Elevare sets a reservation date, that is your Saturday.
- Stop at On the Mark's Cotino store within its first month to see whether the produce and meat program materializes at the promised scale.
- Drive past 71959 CA-111 every couple of weeks. When the exterior scaffolding drops and signage goes up, The Capital Grille is close.
- Put the 2027 Galleri Classic on the March calendar now. Even if you do not usually attend, walking your own back nine while the field is playing it is worth the morning.
The takeaway from the Mission Hills gate
The story of Rancho Mirage this year is not one restaurant opening or one community launching. It is the redistribution of where residents spend their evenings. The Highway 111 corridor is being answered, for the first time in a long time, by a second corridor a few miles north. Mission Hills happens to sit between them. That is a rare position, and it is worth understanding as a resident before it becomes the headline the market writes about the neighborhood.
If you would like a closer read on how these openings are shaping value inside the club's own gates, Desert Cities Home tracks Rancho Mirage's residential market alongside the retail and hospitality shifts feeding into it. Request a free home valuation and custom marketing plan when you are ready to see where your address sits in the new map.
