Here's a look at the best new Dallas/Fort Worth restaurants, corporate event venues, hotels, conference centers, and private and party rooms to open for events this fall. These new and renovated Dallas/Fort Worth venues can accommodate groups large or small for private and corporate events, conferences, meetings, weddings, business dinners, teambuilding activities, cocktail parties, and more.
Paul Martin’s American Grill, a California-based concept, opened its first location in Texas in Turtle Creek in July. The menu features seasonal items as well as natural meats and sustainable seafood, some of which are prepared on a mesquite grill. Vegan dishes and an extensive wine list are available. The main dining room seats 90, while the bar area seats 69. A patio seats 44.
James Beard award-winning chef Tyson Cole opened a location of Austin favorite Uchi in Dallas on June 1. Uchi Dallas offers a modern Japanese menu that changes daily as well as sushi and sashimi and an omakase tasting menu in six or 10 courses. A private room seats 24 people or holds 40 for receptions. The space has a soundproof curtain that can divide the room for smaller groups. Amenities include surround-sound audio, a flat-screen TV for presentations, and floral services. Buyouts are available.
Famed Dallas chef Kent Rathbun opened a Texas-style barbecue and burgers restaurant, Hickory by Kent Rathbun, in June. The eatery is more casual than the chef’s other restaurants, Abacus and Jasper’s, but still offers a thoughtful menu and bar program as well as a modern roadhouse look from designers Jones Baker. It measures 6,500 square feet and offers alfresco dining on a 1,374-square-foot patio with its own fireplace, lounge area, and picnic tables.
The National Cowgirl Museum and Hall of Fame finished the first phase of a renovation in May, debuting a new art gallery and Grand Rotunda. The museum, established in 1975, celebrates trailblazing women of the American West at its 33,000-square-foot building in Fort Worth’s cultural district. For events, the rotunda, lobby, and a lounge are available for groups of as many as 350 for receptions or 200 for seated gatherings. Smaller groups can book the 400-square-foot lounge. The rotunda space has an interactive mobile with photos and video projections that can be customized for events.
After working under some of Dallas’ most notable chefs, chef Jon Thompson and restaurateur Johnny Caros opened their own place, Sugarbacon Proper Kitchen. Located in downtown McKinney, the restaurant serves a Texas-accented menu with items such as smoked Berkshire pork chop with green chile hominy casserole and butterscotch banana pudding. Its bar devised a “garden to glass” cocktail program that uses herbs grown on site, as well as a global wine program. The design from ID4 Studio includes warm leather booths, exposed brick, and concrete floors. The restaurant, which opened in late June, has a 160-seat main dining room, a private room, and a climate-controlled patio that seats 48.
Omni Dallas announced plans to open four new restaurants, two of which are slated to open this fall. The Little Katana, a sushi concept, and the Tex-Mex eatery Herrera's are expected to debut in early October. The other concepts are a beer garden and a pizzeria called Coal Vines. The venues will all include patios. The restaurants are part of a $27 million addition to the downtown hotel, which connects to the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center. The hotel said the new restaurants are a direct response to meeting planners who wanted additional dining options.
Tupps Brewery, a 15,000-square-foot microbrewery in McKinney at the Cotton Mill, opened in May. The venue is available for private events on Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays and offers a small indoor space for about 20 people or a beer garden that holds about 30. Buyouts are not available the rest of the week, but the venue will reserve tables for small groups. Its site is convenient for food-truck-style catering—the brewery even hosts them once a week—and tours are available.
Chef Nathan Tate did not have to look hard for a provider of some of the fresh ingredients that go into the menu at his new restaurant Rapscallion—they come from his family’s Tate Farms in Rockwall, Texas. The restaurant, which opened in July in Lowest Greenville, serves modern takes on Southern and Texan fare such as dry-aged steaks, catfish, and chicken prepared on a custom wood rotisserie. The space seats 78 inside and 34 outside.
Located in downtown Fort Worth's Tower building, the Italian restaurant Vivo 53 opened in May. The menu offers handmade pastas and pizzas—the restaurant’s name refers to the 53 attempts it took to perfect its dough—along with a selection of wines and signature cocktails. The venue features a theater kitchen with a wood-burning oven, tufted leather booths, and white subway tile accents. The 4,500-square-foot space seats 140 diners, and buyouts are allowed.
Fort Worth’s Winslow’s Wine Cafe has expanded to Dallas with a wine bar and restaurant in Oak Lawn. Winslow's Cedar Springs, which soft-opened in June and had a grand opening in July, is about half the size of its original location but shares some of the same menu items. It is available for buyouts of about 40 people for cocktail receptions with passed hors d’oeuvres or a buffet or seated events of 35 guests.
