{"id":145328,"date":"2026-01-31T12:04:23","date_gmt":"2026-01-31T12:04:23","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/145328\/"},"modified":"2026-01-31T12:04:23","modified_gmt":"2026-01-31T12:04:23","slug":"austins-texas-french-bread-unveils-bakery-reopening-4-years-after-fire","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/145328\/","title":{"rendered":"Austin&#8217;s Texas French Bread unveils bakery reopening 4 years after fire"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">For more than 40 years, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysanantonio.com\/food\/article\/texas-french-bread-rebuild-19454877.php\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Texas French Bread;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Texas French Bread<\/a> has been a mainstay in the Texas capital&#8217;s bakery and bistro scene, serving up artisan loaves, pastries, desserts and lunch time sandwiches alongside coffee and tea. Four years ago, an accidental mechanical failure led to a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysanantonio.com\/food\/article\/Texas-French-Bread-partially-reopens-17593327.php\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:devastating fire that destroyed the bakery&#039;s historic building;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">devastating fire that destroyed the bakery&#8217;s historic building<\/a>\u00a0at 29th and Rio Grande streets, amounting to an estimated $1.6 million in damages.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Now, the business is re-emerging from the ashes and poised to reopen its brick-and-mortar later this year. <a href=\"https:\/\/texasfrenchbread.com\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Texas French Bread;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Texas French Bread<\/a> confirmed on social media it will celebrate the grand reopening of its brick and mortar bakery in spring 2026, a resurgence that has been anxiously awaited by Central Texans.\u00a0Over the past four years, the business has operated outdoor dining services and order fulfillments via an Airstream parked in the business&#8217; garden area.<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Texas French Bread, located at the intersection of 29th and Rio Grande streets in Austin, is set to reopen this spring, more than four years after a devastating fire. (Kelsey Thompson\/MySA)\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"rounded-lg\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/04e0221fe08d865b60c27b54ad3263d9.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Texas French Bread, located at the intersection of 29th and Rio Grande streets in Austin, is set to reopen this spring, more than four years after a devastating fire. (Kelsey Thompson\/MySA)<\/p>\n<p><img alt=\"Texas French Bread, located at the intersection of 29th and Rio Grande streets in Austin, is set to reopen this spring, more than four years after a devastating fire. Pictures are Texas French Bread's iced Mexican mocha, a strawberry pastry pocket and a mocha walnut cookie. (Kelsey Thompson\/MySA)\" loading=\"lazy\" width=\"960\" height=\"720\" decoding=\"async\" data-nimg=\"1\" class=\"rounded-lg\" style=\"color:transparent\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/5b5617c898f18a6ba8004eec23e65944.jpeg\"\/><\/p>\n<p>Texas French Bread, located at the intersection of 29th and Rio Grande streets in Austin, is set to reopen this spring, more than four years after a devastating fire. Pictures are Texas French Bread&#8217;s iced Mexican mocha, a strawberry pastry pocket and a mocha walnut cookie. (Kelsey Thompson\/MySA)<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Construction formally began on the rebuild site back in March 2025, the business shared on its\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/texasfrenchbread.substack.com\/p\/rebuild-kicks-off\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Substack page;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Substack page<\/a>, amid painstaking efforts to &#8220;resurrect Texas French Bread&#8217;s home and workspace.&#8221; In a separate <a href=\"https:\/\/texasfrenchbread.substack.com\/p\/rebuild-kicks-off\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Substack post from November 2025;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Substack post from November 2025<\/a>, owner Murph Willcott reflected on the community efforts and camaraderie to support the bakery following the fire, and his anticipation for that first day back within the bakery.<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">&#8220;Texas French Bread has been my life&#8217;s work. But it was Texas French Bread, the restaurant that transformed me, allowing me to feel like the valuable person I had always aspired to be but perhaps never quite felt I was,&#8221; Willcott wrote. &#8220;It gave me a pride of accomplishment that I had not experienced previously. And it was, all in all, a pretty good little restaurant. It was honest and soulful, and even when it wasn&#8217;t perfect it had a big heart. I look forward to the day when I can invite all of you back inside to raise a glass with us and celebrate our grand reopening.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">Find it:\u00a02900 Rio Grande St.,\u00a0Austin, TX 78705<\/p>\n<p class=\"mb-4 text-lg md:leading-8 break-words\">This article originally published at <a href=\"https:\/\/www.mysanantonio.com\/food\/article\/texas-french-bread-austin-reopening-21309566.php?utm_medium=referral&amp;utm_campaign=yahoo_syndication\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\" data-ylk=\"slk:Austin&#039;s Texas French Bread unveils bakery reopening 4 years after fire;elm:context_link;itc:0;sec:content-canvas\" class=\"link \">Austin&#8217;s Texas French Bread unveils bakery reopening 4 years after fire<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For more than 40 years, Texas French Bread has been a mainstay in the Texas capital&#8217;s bakery and&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":145329,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[132,134,133,60916,16225,5862,27],"class_list":["post-145328","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-austin","tag-austin","tag-austin-headlines","tag-austin-news","tag-french-bread","tag-grand-reopening","tag-rio-grande","tag-texas"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145328","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145328"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145328\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/145329"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145328"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145328"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145328"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}