"We decided it would be a perfect collaboration," Michael Judvytis told What Now Atlanta in June. He was explaining why Pisano's, the pizzeria he has run in downtown Kennesaw since 2012, was coming to Marietta Square. He didn't go looking for a spot on the Square. A space opened up next door to Willie Rae's Social House, a restaurant his team had already bought.
That turns out to describe most of 2026 on the Square. Five addresses on or just off the Square got new restaurants or new plans this year. Three went to operators who already ran a business within a block. A fourth went to a buyer whose team, according to one outlet, appears to own another restaurant on the Square. Only one went to a brand with no existing Marietta Square address.
Five addresses, one year
Here is what changed this year and who did it.
| Address | What was there | What's there now or next | Who's behind it |
|---|---|---|---|
| 25 North Park Square | Willie Rae's Social House | Willie Rae's x Pisano's, reopened July 31 | Michael Judvytis, owner of both brands |
| 72 Atlanta Street | Not a Glover Park business | Glover Park Kitchen, grand opening October 9 | The Glover Park Brewery owners |
| 29 West Park Square | Red Hare's Still on the Square | West Park Sports Club, opened April 20 | Fork U Concepts |
| 45 West Park Square | Piastra, then Asher & Rose | Brasserie Genevieve, planned for December or January | Buyer Salem Makhlouf; the team reportedly appears to be L on North's owners |
| 16 Atlanta Street SE | Carmen's Kitchen & Cocktails | Fin & Feathers, soft-opened August 6 | A multi-location brand founded in Atlanta |
The room next door became one restaurant
Pisano's was first announced as a stand-alone second location at 35 North Park Square, with a 1,500-square-foot space and a target opening in early July. The plan in that same June report already pointed at something bigger. The team would redesign Willie Rae's and turn the two concepts into one shared space, styled like a Brooklyn pizzeria with exposed brick, a mural, a stage for live music and karaoke, and an outdoor patio.
The result opened July 31 as Willie Rae's x Pisano's at 25 North Park Square, after several weeks of construction. It serves a shorter menu drawn from both kitchens, with Southern plates from Willie Rae's alongside Pisano's pizza and Italian dishes. Judvytis told What Now Atlanta why he did it. "A lot of people in Marietta will drive to Kennesaw to have our pizza and experience our friendly customer service, our patio and our live music." An owner who already knew the Square used the next storefront to bring a brand he'd built about 20 minutes up the road in Kennesaw.
The brewery crossed the street
Glover Park Kitchen did the same thing on a different block. It sits at 72 Atlanta Street, directly across from Glover Park Brewery. After a soft opening on October 7, it held its grand opening on October 9. The restaurant's own about page says how it's connected to the brewery: "Same ownership. Same commitment to quality. A different place to be."
That ownership goes back to Marietta natives Sam Rambo and Hank DuPre, who founded the brewery. Kevin McNerney, a co-founder of SweetWater Brewing, joined them later. Executive Chef Lance Hagan runs a seasonal, Southern-inspired menu of shareable plates for lunch and dinner, with cocktails, wine and beer brewed across the street. The kitchen scored 100 on its first health inspection on July 28. That inspection report also showed raw oysters would be on the menu.
The owners now run both sides of a stretch of Atlanta Street, and anyone walking over from Glover Park passes both.
The group with the most addresses added one more
Fork U Concepts, the Marietta restaurant group owned by Alexis and Scott Kinsey, was already on the Square before 2026. Its Square-area restaurants include:
- Taqueria Tsunami, 70 South Park Square
- Stockyard Burgers & Bones, 26 Mill Street
- West Park Sports Club, 29 West Park Square, opened April 20, 2026
According to Marietta.com, West Park Sports Club moved into the building that held Red Hare's Still on the Square and, before that, Hemingway's Bar & Grill. It's an upscale sports bar with a darker, leather-heavy interior, lots of TVs, live music and room for private events. The menu includes a smokehouse stack, a "rubenesque" grouper, Tokyo fries and a bulgogi cheesesteak.
With this opening, the Kinseys have restaurants on the south side of the Square, the west side and Mill Street. When people talk about "eating on the Square," a good share of those meals now come out of one local group's kitchens.
45 West Park Square, three concepts at one address
The building at 45 West Park Square shows the same pattern from another angle.
Piastra opened there in 2015 and spent about ten years as a full-service Italian restaurant facing Glover Park. After its last dinner on December 31, 2025, the same owners turned the space into Asher & Rose Modern Grocers, a specialty market, cafe and bar that opened in late January 2026. So it was a new format from an operator who had been on the Square for years. Marietta.com reports that the company behind it filed a voluntary Chapter 11 petition on May 7, 2026, and the Marietta Daily Journal later reported that the store was closing.
The same Marietta.com account has a figure that puts the whole year in context. It reports that the Square went from roughly 28 food and beverage locations when Piastra arrived in 2015 to about 43 by 2026. That's about 15 more places in roughly a decade, all competing for the same few blocks.
According to Marietta.com, the court approved a sale of the business assets and an assignment of the lease on August 27. The building was not part of that sale. What Now Atlanta confirmed the deal with new owner Salem Makhlouf and said the team behind the new restaurant appears to be the owners of L on North, a restaurant already on Marietta Square with a second location in Canton. The new concept is Brasserie Genevieve, a French brasserie expected to open in December or January.
It's a big room. What Now Atlanta describes 6,000 square feet on the main level, a 3,000-square-foot basement and a 1,200-square-foot mezzanine. That's enough for 130 seats inside, 45 on the sidewalk patio and 30 at the bar.
The one outside brand came with a playbook
Fin & Feathers is the year's real newcomer. It soft-opened August 6 at 16 Atlanta Street SE, the former Carmen's Kitchen & Cocktails, as East Cobb Beacon reported. It didn't arrive as an untested idea. Founder Damon A. Johnson Sr. started the brand in Atlanta in 2019 and has since expanded across Georgia and to Las Vegas. The brand's website lists the Marietta location as "Now Open."
The menu covers Southern comfort food, seafood, steaks and brunch: shrimp and grits, catfish and grits, chicken and waffles, honey bourbon salmon, lamb chops and jerk chicken egg rolls. The house rules carry over from the brand's other locations. After 8 p.m., guests must be 21 or older with photo ID, and a 20% gratuity is added to every bill. Those rules are worth knowing before a late dinner with a group.
What's still filling in
A few smaller changes round out the year. El Jalisco opened August 17 inside Marietta Square Market, the downtown food hall. On Roswell Street, Two Bells Burgers & Cheesesteaks is getting ready to replace Boru Ramen Noodle & Poke Bar at No. 154. Marietta.com noted it will join a crowded burger and cheesesteak field near the Square that includes Woody's Cheesesteaks on Church Street, Philly & Wrap and Roxy's Burger inside the food hall, Two Birds Taphouse, and Fork U's own Stockyard and West Park Sports Club.
Two Bells will open into a Square that, by Marietta.com's count, has gone from about 28 food and beverage spots to about 43, with six of the places just named already serving burgers or cheesesteaks.
If you want to know who's behind the storefronts on the blocks you care about, Bolst Homes agents follow those changes on the Marietta neighborhood page and are glad to talk through what's opening around the Square. Find a Home. Make an Impact.
