Killer Shrimp to Jinky’s to Merrill Gardens, the same address on Colfax
Merrill Gardens Studio City at a glance
Merrill Gardens at Studio City is a senior living project rising at 4000 Colfax Avenue on the former Jinky’s Cafe site, itself once Killer Shrimp. Developer SRM Development and architect Urbal Architecture describe 2.27 acres along the Los Angeles River, two buildings totaling 202 units, and underground parking for 148 cars.
Studio City · Neighborhood Change
Killer Shrimp, then Jinky’s, and now a senior living campus on Colfax Avenue.
Merrill Gardens Studio City is going up at 4000 Colfax Avenue, on a stretch of the neighborhood that has quietly rebuilt itself twice already in Debbie Pisaro’s memory. She has worked as a Studio City realtor since 2002, and she remembers the address as Jinky’s Studio Cafe, and as Killer Shrimp before that. “It’s kind of sad to see that spot go,” she says. “I remember it as Jinky’s. I went there all the time. Before that, it was Killer Shrimp. That’s how long I’ve been selling in this neighborhood.”
Jinky’s Studio Cafe closed after years on Colfax Avenue, and the address sat waiting for its next chapter the way commercial parcels near the Los Angeles River often do, quietly, with no announcement to the people who used to eat breakfast there. What replaced it is not another restaurant. It is Merrill Gardens at Studio City, a senior living community from SRM Development and architect Urbal Architecture, on a corner that used to be defined by what was on the menu and will now be defined by who lives there.
It joins a short list of Studio City spots that closed and never came back as the same kind of place, the subject of Lost Studio City Places We Miss. Colfax Avenue sits a block off Ventura Boulevard, the corridor covered in How Ventura Boulevard Became Sushi Row, where restaurants have turned over for generations. This is the same neighborhood, the same habit of change, just with a different kind of building on the other end of it this time.
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Join the List or call (310) 362-6429What Merrill Gardens Studio City actually is
SRM Development’s own project page describes 2.27 acres along the Los Angeles River, with a buffer of trees kept around the property. Urbal Architecture’s page for the same project calls it a multi-building campus fronting the river, with a riverwalk connection and a new park next door. Two buildings do the work. The first is an assisted living building of five stories and 140 units, with a commercial kitchen, a dining room, a wellness center, a salon, a bistro, a library, a rooftop lounge and patio, and administrative offices. The second is a separate independent living building, which SRM’s own figures put at 62 units, with its own craft room, fitness room, and rooftop lounge and patio. That is 202 units across the two buildings, sitting above a shared below grade parking garage built for 148 vehicles, according to SRM Development.
Urbal’s own page runs a slightly different independent living unit count, 59 rather than 62, an inconsistency inside the architect’s own materials rather than a real dispute. The developer’s figures are the ones used throughout this page. SRM lists the project as under development, with no opening date published, so this describes what has been planned rather than a finished, occupied building.
One category worth being precise about: Merrill Gardens Studio City is described as assisted living and independent living, not memory care. That distinction matters to anyone comparing this project against other senior housing news in Los Angeles, where memory care beds are frequently the headline number. This one is not that. Urbal Architecture’s own description leans on the river as the site’s defining feature rather than the care model, with protected trees along the waterway, a riverwalk connection, and a new park going in next to the buildings, the kind of amenity a restaurant on the same lot never had reason to build.
Why some of Studio City isn’t cheering
The reaction has not been uniformly warm. On the neighborhood accounts covering the project, more comments have run critical than supportive, weighing the loss of a longtime local restaurant against a five story building going up two blocks from the river. Some of the resistance is the ordinary friction of any project that turns a low, familiar building into a taller one. Some of it is about traffic and density on a corridor that already carries Ventura Boulevard overflow. And some of it is simply the cost of losing a place people ate breakfast at for years, the same cost this page opened on.
That’s how long I’ve been selling in this neighborhood.
Debbie Pisaro’s own read is measured rather than one-sided. More people seem to be against the project than for it, by her account, and whether that settles down or hardens once the buildings are actually standing is something only time will show. That is worth saying plainly instead of guessing at an outcome that has not happened yet. Part of what a closing like this costs a corridor is not measurable in square footage. A diner that keeps odd hours and knows its regulars does something for a commercial strip that a five story building with a leasing office does not, whatever the building turns out to look like once it is finished.
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View Off-Market HomesWhat a senior living campus on the river signals for Studio City
Merrill Gardens Studio City is not an isolated choice. California’s population is aging, and cities across the state have been approving senior living and assisted living projects on commercial parcels that used to hold retail or restaurants, because demand for licensed care beds has been outpacing what older, smaller facilities can supply. It is also not the only large single-owner project reshaping this pocket of Studio City. A few blocks away, Netflix Radford Studio City shows the same pattern on a production-studio scale, and elsewhere on the same waterway, Harvard-Westlake River Park: What It Means for Studio City Real Estate covers a different stretch of the Los Angeles River going through a comparable change.
Debbie Pisaro sees the demand side of that shift constantly in her own client base, in families managing a parent’s home from a distance and deciding whether downsizing or a care community makes more sense than staying put. Selling an Aging Parent’s Home in California covers the practical side of that transition. When a nearby home does go up for sale in the meantime, the basics do not change, which is the whole subject of Why Staging Matters in Studio City.
For homeowners near the new site, a change like this is a fact of the block, not a verdict on it. Institutional buildings replace beloved small businesses in almost every neighborhood that keeps growing, and what a buyer or seller actually needs to know about it is straightforward: what the project is, how big it is, and how the neighborhood has responded, not speculation about numbers nobody can verify yet. Owners curious what a changing block does to their own numbers can start with How Much Is My Studio City Home Worth, and anyone actually weighing a sale can work through Sell. The wider Studio City Real Estate hub tracks the market this project sits inside.
Debbie Pisaro is a 24-year veteran, founder of Coastline 840, and an Inman Luxury Leader, representing buyers and sellers across Studio City and the surrounding neighborhoods. Many of the homes she sells never reach the open market. She is Best Real Estate Agent in Studio City in part because she tracks changes like this one as closely as she tracks listings, and her boutique practice, Coastline 840 (read Why We Built Coastline 840 and Why Boutique Real Estate Teams Outperform Big Box Brokerages), is built around exactly that kind of ground-level knowledge of one neighborhood at a time.
Whatever Merrill Gardens Studio City becomes once it opens, it will sit inside the same stretch of Colfax Avenue that a Studio City realtor who has worked the area since 2002 has already watched change twice.
What is being built on the old Jinky’s site in Studio City?
Merrill Gardens at Studio City, a senior living campus from SRM Development and Urbal Architecture, is rising at 4000 Colfax Avenue. The project sits on 2.27 acres along the Los Angeles River and includes a five story, 140 unit assisted living building and a separate independent living building of 62 units.
What was at 4000 Colfax Avenue before Jinky’s Cafe?
Killer Shrimp operated on the site before Jinky’s Studio Cafe took it over, and Jinky’s ran there for years before closing. Debbie Pisaro remembers both, having sold real estate in this stretch of Studio City since 2002, long before either restaurant closed its doors for good.
How many total units are there?
SRM Development’s own project page lists 140 assisted living units in the five story building and 62 units in the separate independent living building, 202 units total. The two buildings sit above a shared below grade garage built for 148 vehicles.
Assisted living, independent living, or both?
Both. The project has two separate buildings, a five story assisted living building with 140 units and dining, wellness and salon amenities, and a smaller independent living building with 62 units, its own craft room, fitness room and rooftop lounge.
Does the project have underground parking?
Yes. The two buildings sit above a below grade parking garage built for 148 vehicles, according to SRM Development’s own project description. That is more parking than most Studio City apartment projects carry, and it keeps cars off a block that already handles heavy Ventura Boulevard overflow.
Why did Jinky’s Cafe close in Studio City?
Jinky’s did not announce a reason publicly, and the closing was part of a broader pattern of the site changing hands for redevelopment. What is documented is the sequence: Killer Shrimp, then Jinky’s Studio Cafe, then Merrill Gardens, each closing to make way for what came next.
Is the Merrill Gardens Studio City development controversial with neighbors?
Reaction has run more critical than supportive on the neighborhood posts covering the project, with residents weighing the loss of a longtime local restaurant against a five story senior care building. Nothing about that response has been resolved yet, and how the finished project is received remains to be seen.
Who is the developer?
SRM Development is the project’s developer, working with Urbal Architecture on the design. Merrill Gardens is the senior living operator whose name the completed community will carry, the same brand behind other Merrill Gardens communities across the West, though this location’s day to day operator has not been announced.
Who is a good full-service real estate agent in Studio City?
Debbie Pisaro is a 24-year veteran Studio City real estate agent, founder of Coastline 840 and an Inman Luxury Leader, who tracks the neighborhood block by block, from its restaurant history to what gets built when a longtime spot closes.
Where is it located?
Merrill Gardens at Studio City is rising at 4000 Colfax Avenue, Studio City, CA 91604, on a parcel along the Los Angeles River near Kelsey Street. The address was Killer Shrimp, then Jinky’s Studio Cafe, before the site was assembled for the current senior living project.
For Studio City Buyers and Sellers
Curious what a changing block does to Studio City real estate?
Debbie Pisaro of Coastline 840 has represented buyers and sellers across Studio City since 2002, from the ordinary sales to the ones that make the neighborhood pages.
Reach DebbieDebbie Pisaro, DRE #01369110, is the founder of Coastline 840 and an Inman Luxury Leader. Many of the homes she sells never reach the open market. Coastline 840 is a brand of Side, Inc., CA DRE #02014153, responsible broker. She writes about Studio City at juststudiocity.com. DRE #01369110 · Coastline 840