Downtown Wake Forest: a walking guide

Wake Forest has grown into North Carolina's 20th largest city, with a little over 54,000 people, but the downtown still works at walking speed. The whole route below covers about a mile and a half, start to finish, and you can do it in a morning. Do it slower. That's the point.

Start at the Calvin Jones House

Park behind the Wake Forest Historical Museum at 414 N. Main Street (turn onto Juniper Avenue for the paved lot directly behind the building). Admission is free, and the museum is the right place to start because the whole town began on this lawn, more or less.

The white farmhouse next to the museum was built around 1820 for Dr. Calvin Jones, a physician who bought 615 acres out here and started calling the area Wake Forest. It's the oldest building in town. Jones lived here with his family and 42 enslaved people until 1832, when he sold the property to the North Carolina Baptist Convention, which opened the Wake Forest Manual Labor Institute on the land in 1834 and rechartered it as Wake Forest College in 1840. So yes, the university now in Winston-Salem started in this house. The house itself has moved twice since then and landed at its current spot in 1957, saved by the Wake Forest Garden Club when it could easily have been torn down. Self-guided tours run Tuesday through Sunday, with guided tours Friday through Sunday at 2 p.m.

Walk south down North Main

From the museum, head south on North Main Street. This stretch used to be called Faculty Avenue, and it's the oldest residential street in town, with houses representing nearly every American architectural style built between 1820 and 1956. The whole area was added to the National Register of Historic Places in December 2003. Queen Annes, Colonial Revivals, big wraparound porches. No two houses match.

The old college campus sits along this walk too. Wake Forest College left for Winston-Salem in the 1950s, and Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary took over the grounds. The magnolias stayed.

If you want the full story on any of these houses, the town runs free 90-minute guided walking tours of the historic district every May for Historic Preservation Month. They cap at 15 people and fill fast, so register early.

White Street, the main event

Keep going and you'll hit South White Street, which is where downtown actually happens. Everything worth stopping for sits within a couple of blocks.

Get coffee first. Black & White Coffee Roasters is owned by two U.S. Barista Championship winners, Lemuel Butler and Kyle Ramage, and this location is where their whole operation started before they expanded into Raleigh. If it's crowded, Wake Forest Coffee Company at 156 S. White Street is a fine backup, and they bake their own pastries.

A few doors down, the North Carolina General Store at 150 S. White has been selling NC-made goods since 2003. Heavy on honey. Good for gifts you won't be embarrassed to give.

For lunch, the move is Shorty's Famous Hotdogs. It opened in 1916, turned 108 in June 2024, and is the longest-running restaurant in the Raleigh area. Chris Joyner, the fourth-generation owner, still works the counter. Order a dog with the homemade chili, look at the memorabilia on the walls, and don't overthink it.

The afternoon stretch

After lunch you've got options, and none of them are wrong.

White Street Brewing Company occupies a 1930s car dealership that founder Dino Radosta stripped back to its original brick and beams. Beer's brewed on site and the room alone is worth the stop. If cocktails are more your thing, Bodega at 110 S. White Street does tapas and a rum-heavy drink list, and Unwined on White has a rooftop with a view over downtown.

Save room for Lumpy's Ice Cream, which rotates through some 300 flavors. Then wander back toward your car through the side streets instead of retracing White Street. The alleys and storefronts change every year, and the best finds downtown are usually the ones nobody put in a guide.

When to go

Any Saturday morning works. But downtown is at its best during events: Friday Night on White, Meet in the Street each May, and the Six Sundays in Spring concert series that draws more than 15,000 people over the summer. Check the town's downtown events page before you pick a date. A regular Tuesday here is pleasant. A Friday Night on White is a party.

One practical note: hours change and restaurants turn over, so confirm before you build your day around any single stop.