Here's a look at restaurants and bars suitable for entertaining clients, treating a team, or even making a private presentation outside the office.
Emory Village's Ink & Elm offers plenty of options. There's a casual tavern, a main dining room, and a lounge for pre- or post-meal drinks or locally sourced, organic oysters, cheese, and charcuterie. And for groups the upscale restaurant has a private 20-seat dining room furnished with a fireplace, a large frontage window, and two centerpiece tables that resemble drafting tables similar to those inside architect Frederick Law Olmsted’s studio.
Photo: Chris Watkins/Ordinary Photography
Chef Ford Fry's St. Cecilia is a 11,000-square-foot space marked with vintage details such as distressed wall mirrors and reclaimed wood flooring. The light-filled design matches the coastal European cuisine served at the restaurant, where groups can take over the 40-person private room on the second floor. For smaller gatherings, there are three marble stone chef's tables that each seat four guests.
Photo: Andrew Thomas Lee
Located downtown, Cuts Steakhouse offers a Southern twist to the traditional steakhouse. The restaurant opened in January and is furnished with dark wooden walls, tufted gray booths, and ceramic deer heads. For groups, there are two private dining rooms—one seats 88 while the other seats 56—as well as semiprivate areas that are separated by beaded curtains.
Photo: Courtesy of Cuts Steakhouse
For dining with a view, there's Nikolai’s Roof, the haute cuisine restaurant perched on the 30th floor of the Hilton Atlanta. The eatery reopened in January following a $1 million renovation and now offers a look inspired by cold Russian winters and ice, with glass chandeliers with intertwined glass ribbons, columns finished with a decorative cracked-glass effect, and fabrics and leathers in cream and grey.
Photo: Sarah Dodge
For a more playful group, Zeal is a modern eatery with an outdoor lounge that has areas to play shuffleboard and darts. The restaurant in East Cobb offers seasonal and locally sourced dishes including lunch and late-night snacks. Indoors there's a 120-seat dining room as well as a "living room" that seats 25.
Photo: Courtesy of Zeal
Ford Fry is also behind King & Duke, a informal, but upscale restaurant named for two characters from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Book shelves figure into the decor, as do leather accents and hardwood floors, but the centerpiece is the 24-foot wood-burning hearth, where much of the menu is cooked. There's an 80-seat outdoor patio for warm-weather entertaining; those looking for more privacy can take over the Drawing Room, which has the capacity for 14.
Photo: Andrew Thomas Lee Photography
For those willing to experiment, Gunshow is chef Kevin Gillespie's ambitious eatery that's anything but stuffy. The spare, 2,500-square-foot space is designed to put guests in the kitchen, and the ordering process involves chefs bringing plates to diners dim-sum-style. Gunshow has 60 seats; a 10-seat bar area faces the chef's counter.
Photo: Angie Mosier
