Multnomah Village
A small-town main street tucked into SW Portland's hills — independent shops, a beloved bookstore, and the distinct feeling that this place has been here a while and intends to stay.
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Multnomah Village has one of the more distinct origin stories in Portland's neighborhoods. It was originally the town of Multnomah — an independent incorporated municipality with its own city hall, fire department, and schools. Founded in 1903, Multnomah incorporated as its own city and operated independently for nearly two decades before Portland annexed it in 1925.
That independent heritage left its mark on the built environment. The main street — SW Capitol Highway — has the feel of a small-town commercial district from the 1920s and 1930s, with low-rise brick storefronts and buildings that predate Portland's annexation. Unlike many neighborhood commercial strips that lost their character to suburban retrofits, Multnomah Village held together.
The neighborhood sits in SW Portland's hills, separated from the rest of the city by topography and the Barbur Boulevard corridor. That geographic separation has contributed to a sense of insularity and community cohesion that residents tend to describe as one of the neighborhood's most valued characteristics.
Food & Drink
The main street strip has a mix of independent restaurants and longtime neighborhood spots. Fat City Café is a neighborhood institution — breakfast all day, booths, and the kind of unpretentious comfort food that keeps a diner busy for decades. The village has avoided the chain retail that characterizes similar commercial districts elsewhere, keeping a mix of locally owned businesses that gives the strip a coherent character.
What to See
Books Around the Corner is one of Portland's cherished independent bookshops — a small, well-curated neighborhood bookstore of the type that has been disappearing everywhere except Portland. It is exactly what a neighborhood bookstore should be.
Gabriel Park, the largest park in SW Portland, is a few blocks from the village — 90 acres of off-leash dog area, sports fields, community gardens, and a skate park that has been popular with SW residents for years. The park connects to a network of trails in the Fanno Creek Greenway.
Curious Facts
- →Multnomah was an independent city from 1903 until Portland annexed it in 1925. The old Multnomah City Hall building still stands on SW Capitol Highway — now a private business, but the structure is original.
- →The name "Multnomah" comes from the Multnomah people, a Chinookan-speaking group who lived at the confluence of the Willamette and Columbia rivers. The name is believed to derive from a word meaning "down the river."
- →Multnomah Village is one of the few Portland neighborhoods that has never had a Starbucks on its main commercial street — a fact that its residents mention with a certain amount of pride.