One of San Francisco’s favorite ice cream shops is opening a second location. Polly Ann Ice Cream — the Outer Sunset shop known for untraditional flavors, including durian, merlot, and pineapple hibiscus — will open in the coming weeks at 160 Pine St. in the Financial District.
Though the new shop will launch as a pop-up, owner Alex Viafara hopes to make it permanent when the three-month lease expires. “I’m not in the pop-up mindset,” he says. “I want it to be for good, so I’m establishing it to be a full Polly Ann Ice Cream, with at least 48 or 50 flavors available.”
The original location of the cheery, unassuming shop, on Noriega near 39th Avenue, has been open since 1955 under various owners. Viafara purchased the business in 2021, though he’d been making ice cream since he was in his 20s, when he’d whip up batches at home on a KitchenAid standmixer with his mother. “I always loved ice cream, and I always wanted to open my own ice cream store,” he says…