The future of the Hideout Theatre, the caffeinated haven for Austin’s improv comedy scene, is looking a little brighter as the Congress Avenue mainstay has found a new home.
The Hideout’s management team announced Friday that, after a lengthy search, it will become part of the Art Hub ATX complex (formerly Good Dads Studios) at 2801 S. I-35.
It’s good news after bad, as the Hideout has been forced out of its original historic home at 617 Congress Avenue. The relocation comes after the property owners informed the Hideout team that they would be turning the building into a bar, and that the theatre would have to vacate the premises when their lease expires on September 18. However, starting early 2026, they plan to be part of Art Hub’s mix of visual and performance arts.
Co-owner and general manager Kareem Badr said that the hunt for a new home began in late January, and Art Hub ATX came on their radar two months ago. Initially, the team was concerned that it was smaller than their current location, “but then we came to the building [and] as soon as we got to the space it feels like funky old Austin.” Totaling around 40,000 square feet, it has space to move both the coffee shop and the theatre (which, he noted, are two completely different operations under the same management).
The move undeniably marks the end of an era for the Hideout. Aside from being one of Austin’s most beloved cafes, the combination venue/coffee shop has been the heart of the local improv scene. It also spent much of that era as a regular venue for South by Southwest, Austin Film Festival, and the Moontower Comedy Festival. The Hideout, as it was originally known, was founded in 1999 by Sean Hill and Shana Merlin of the Austin-based improv comedy troupe We Could Be Heroes to create a home for improv in Austin and also add much-needed performance spaces in the heart of the city. With two stages – the 50-seat upstairs cabaret room and the 74-seat black box theatre at the back – and a thriving coffee shop, it opened just as Downtown Austin was coming back from decades in the doldrums. It became ground zero for Austin’s expanding comedy scene, paving the way for dedicated venues like Fallout Theater and ColdTowne Theater and providing inspiration for hybrid coffee shop venues like Kick Butt Coffee and Genuine Joe Coffeeshop (which also just relocated from its old Anderson Lane home to a nearby shared address with Russell’s Bakery).
In 2009, the venue (now renamed as the Hideout Coffee House and Theatre) was sold to a group from the improv community including Badr and Roy Janik of Parallelogramophonograph, and Jessica Arjet of the Flying Theater Machine, who have continued the traditions begun by Hill and Merlin, and will keep them going at the new home.
Unlike the two-stage Congress site, the Art Hub ATX location only has room for one theatre, seating about 100 audience members. However, for the first time there will be dedicated classroom space, with three rooms that will host improv classes. This means that the new venue will not have the original’s second stage, but Badr said they are doing “some creative problem solving” with the architects at Studio Steinbomer to maybe add that additional room.
“As soon as we got to the space it feels like funky old Austin.”
Leaving Congress will also mean a radical change for the Hideout’s coffee business, not least losing the regular foot traffic. However, with over 100 artists holding studio space at Art Hub ATX, plus regular events, Badr was confident that they will quickly build up a new customer base. Plus, he added, the new location has “a giant parking lot and, coming from Downtown, where we literally have no parking even for staff, that’s amazing.”
The hope is that construction should take three months, give or take for permitting or snags – “and there’s always a snag,” Badr laughed. After all, he’s spent 16 years keeping the character-filled but occasionally cranky Congress Avenue site open, so the mercurial vicissitudes of building management and maintenance are nothing new to him. “My job is to mitigate disasters,” he said. “First it was a hotel building next to us for three years, then it was COVID, then it was this.”
The team already has a contractor, Lovejoy Construction, which has been working with them since the opening of the old Hideout Annex on North Lamar, and has been working with architects at Studio Steinbomer for months.
“The hunt is done,” Badr said, “and now it’s time for renovation and spending lots of money.”
The process will not be cheap, as they will have to build out both the performance space and a coffee shop. The team is currently fundraising, with a goal of $500,000, through their own Fundrazr campaign and through a sister campaign run through Austin Creative Alliance for larger, tax-deductible donations.
The relocation is good news for the Hideout crew, but it’s still undeniably a loss for the Downtown community. In its current location and incarnation the Hideout had become an area mainstay, the last survivor of beloved coffee shops like Little City, which closed in 2012, and the Starbucks at 600 Congress, famous as both the busiest Starbucks in town and as the shooting location for Sandra Bullock’s opening scene in Miss Congeniality. Across the decades, the Hideout won five Best of Austin awards not only as a theatre but also as an exhibition space and, yes, for its coffee too. In addition, multiple artists have snagged BOAs on the basis of their tenure, including Parallelogramophonograph, Live Nude Improv, and Flying Theater Machine.
However, in a little bit of good news about the 617 Congress location, the property owners have given Badr and the team an extension on their lease through November. This will give regulars at the original Hideout a few more chances to say farewell to the place that has become a brick-and-stone home away from home for coffee lovers and improv fans alike.
It’ll also be a chance for Badr to say goodbye to the original location before the Hideout enters its new era. He said, “I started there as a student, and I love that funky old building. … It’s my Millennium Falcon. I know where to hit it to make it work, and I know what panel to remove to fix it.”
This article appears in July 11 • 2025.
