WSB-TV reported Sandy Springs Director of Economic Development Chris Burnett saying, "We had discussions and decided that 65/35 is a good balance." It sounds like a zoning footnote. It helps explain which concepts may open in City Springs, even as a full-service Italian restaurant on Roswell Road has closed its doors.
Two restaurant stories unfolded in Sandy Springs this year. One closed. One spent almost triple its renovation budget to reopen bigger. A city ordinance passed a year earlier changed the rules for future City Springs openings, and may shape what comes next in the district.
A Roswell Road Storefront Changes Hands
ToNeTo Atlanta reported that Baraonda Ristorante closed permanently on August 25, 2026. The sign taped to the door thanked customers for their support and gave no reason for the closure. Most local coverage described it as the end of a nearly 25-year run, and that framing isn't wrong exactly, but it flattens a more specific timeline. The restaurant opened on Peachtree Street in Midtown in 2000, closed there in 2021 after owners Costanzo Astarita and Mario Maccarrone decided to downsize, and didn't reopen at 6075 Roswell Road in Sandy Springs until 2023. The brand is 25 years old. The Sandy Springs storefront that just went dark had been open about three.
That distinction clarifies the timeline. The Sandy Springs address had a shorter history than the brand behind it: about three years in a space of roughly 3,800 square feet, compared with the nearly 7,000-square-foot Midtown original.
The space isn't sitting empty for long. According to WhatNow, Korbiz Hospitality Group has signed a ten-year lease to bring MOA Korean Bistro into the same 4,000-square-foot address, with seating for 100, a 15-seat bar and a 36-seat patio. It's the group's first restaurant in Georgia after building MOA Korean BBQ & Bar and 929 Kitchen & Bar in Columbia, South Carolina. A ten-year lease on that address shows continued operator interest in the Roswell Road corridor, and it is a different kind of investment from the one Rumi's Kitchen made this year.
Rumi's Kitchen Bet the Opposite Way
As Atlanta Magazine reported, Rumi's Kitchen underwent the most expensive renovation in its history. The flagship location closed in March 2025 for what owner-chef Ali Mesghali expected to be a six-month, $3.5 million refresh. It reopened almost a year later, on March 6, 2026, after the budget nearly tripled.
Mesghali's explanation for the overrun was blunt: the kitchen had gotten too small for the volume it was doing. He told Atlanta Magazine the location was "doing six-times the sales from the original Rumi's," and the new build reflects that math. The redesigned space, done by Johnson Studio at Cooper Carry, includes a 22-seat curved marble bar, a private dining room with a floor-to-ceiling mural by artist Dean Barger, and plaster walls installed specifically to fix a noise complaint that had followed the old dining room for years. After a five-year search, Mesghali also hired a pastry chef, Sohrob Esmaili, winner of the 2021 Food Network Spring Baking Championship, whose menu now includes a Persian ice cream sandwich and a majoon toffee cake. Sunday brunch launched March 15.
Baraonda's closure and Rumi's Kitchen's reopening are two different chapters in the same year for Sandy Springs dining, one ending a three-year run at its Roswell Road address and the other expanding a flagship to match its sales. The City Springs ordinance vote did not drive either story, but it shapes the next wave of openings.
The Ratio That's Doing the Sorting Now
Rough Draft Atlanta reported that City Springs restaurants have operated under a 50/50 alcohol-to-food sales requirement since the district's lease agreements were first written and that, on September 2, 2025, the city council voted to raise that ceiling to 65/35, but only for beer and wine, not full liquor licenses.
The vote was a response to a business model that couldn't fit the old rule. Taste Wine Bar and Market wanted to open a self-service wine bar and counter-service deli at 6405 Blue Stone Road, in the former Turn Cycling Studio space, and Burnett's report to the council noted that an average entree of $15 to $20 paired with a $15 glass of wine simply couldn't hold to 50/50. Council member John Paulson pushed back during discussion, noting, as Rough Draft Atlanta reported, that the original ratio existed to keep City Springs from filling up with what he called an overwhelming number of saloons. The council settled on 65/35 as the compromise, and city staff were explicit that the goal was to widen the door for concepts like microbreweries, specifically naming the historic Williams Payne House as a property that could benefit.
| Old rule (pre-Sept 2025) | Current rule | |
|---|---|---|
| Alcohol share of sales allowed | Up to 50% | Up to 65% |
| Applies to | Beer, wine and liquor | Beer and wine only |
| Business types it opened the door to | Traditional full-service dining | Self-pour wine bars, potential microbreweries |
Taste's second location is a direct product of that vote. It sits on the same short stretch of Blue Stone Road that turns into a two-day festival grounds every September, which means the ordinance and the neighborhood's biggest annual street party are now geographically the same few blocks.
What's Actually on the Calendar This Fall
That overlap showed up directly last weekend. The Blue Stone Arts & Music Festival took over four city blocks in the heart of City Springs on September 25 and 26. As Rough Draft Atlanta previewed, the festival's fourth year as a free downtown fair featured Allen Stone and the Nicotine Dolls headlining the two nights and a market of more than 60 artists filling the same corridor where Taste's wine bar is moving in.
The rest of the fall calendar in Sandy Springs runs through mid-October and into December:
- The Sandy Springs Fall Arts Festival, a free juried show with 120 to 130 artist booths, ran September 12 and 13 at 6100 Lake Forrest Drive
- Paws and Pastries, now in its seventh year, returns October 17 at Morgan Falls Overlook Park with a dog costume contest and separate fenced areas for small and large dogs
- OktoberFEAST runs the same weekend, October 17 and 18, on the City Green, with live music from the Swinging Bavarians and an expanded German food and beverage lineup
- Spooky Springs closes out the fall run of community events later in October
- Applications for the Sparkle Sandy Springs Parade, held December 6, are due October 26
None of these events are new to the city's calendar in concept. What's changed is the texture around them. A festival weekend that used to be bookended by a handful of familiar restaurant names now runs past a storefront in transition from Baraonda to MOA Korean Bistro, a flagship restaurant that just rebuilt itself around triple its original budget, and a wine bar that only exists because the city rewrote its own math to let it in.
The Corridor Isn't Finished Changing
Burnett's report to the council flagged a second phase of City Springs development already in the pipeline, with another restaurant space expected as part of it. Combined with the city's stated interest in bringing microbreweries into a building like the Williams Payne House, the 65/35 ratio isn't a one-time fix for a single wine bar. It's the new baseline for what gets proposed next in that district, and it's a lower bar for beverage-forward concepts than City Springs has had since it opened.
Sandy Springs residents watching the restaurant scene this fall aren't just watching individual openings and closures. They're watching the effect of a rule change that took a year to show up in storefronts, and it's still working its way through the corridor.
If you're the kind of Sandy Springs neighbor who tracks what's opening on Blue Stone Road before it hits the local news feed, Tommy Nguyen covers these shifts as they happen, because knowing a neighborhood this well is the same skill whether you're picking a dinner spot or eventually picking a street.
This article is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. Consult a qualified professional about your situation.
