Susan Corcoran will tear the paper off her Brattle Street storefront this Saturday and open the Museum of Useful Things.

It will be one of two stores opening in Harvard Square this weekend and one of five to open within the last three weeks, a trend local property owners say indicates that the real estate market around Harvard is picking up after a lean period through last year.

If all goes as planned, an additional five stores will open in the Square by June.

Richard Getz, who manages several high-profile Square properties, including the building which, since last Saturday, houses the Cross Store, said that demand for commercial real estate has jumped since last year.

“There’s definitely higher demand. We’re getting calls...there’s much more interest,” said Getz, the president of Richard Getz and Associates, which also manages the building housing Brattle Street Florists and Hidden Sweets. John DiGiovanni, the president of Trinity Properties, which owns The Garage, agreed that business was picking up.

Felipe’s Taqueria opened in the Garage earlier this month.

“I think things are improving. The Square was feeling the same economic environment you see in the local, state and even national level,” he said. “There’s a certain amount of insulation, but [the Square] has felt the same climate.”

Getz emphasized, however, that because of the Square’s “cache,” demand never gets “really weak,” even in a recession.

The Museum of Useful Things is moving about a mile away from its present space on 370 Broadway St. to a storefront across the street from Crate and Barrel. Corcoran, the store’s owner, also owns nearby Black Ink.

“It’s a better location and we wanted synergy [with Black Ink],” Corcoran said, adding that the two stores were different in that Black Ink was more geared toward gifts.

The Museum of Useful Things, which is about the same size as Black Ink, features items like restaurant-style napkin dispensers, bookends that look like lockers, tape measures, measuring cups and bells.

“The Museum of Useful Things sells only functional items for home and office use. The merchandise is quite different,” Corcoran said.

She demonstrated a metal bouncing fruit basket that falls and rises as fruit is added or removed from it.

On the other side of Brattle Street, City Sports will move into the storefront above Ann Taylor that was vacated by Utrecht Art Supplies last summer, leaving behind its 16 Dunster St. location by June.

“It’s a bigger space...that’s the main reason behind the move,” said clothing manager Emily Schreiber. “There will be nothing different. Just more styles of the same stuff.”