Who opened Paces Ferry Road's newest Italian restaurant? The answer is a couple who had been running a burger place in the same room for nine years. And what is going up at Vinings Slope, the corner first pitched as five stories with hundreds of apartments? A single-story building with parking for 112 cars.
Both projects tell the same story about Vinings this fall. The village is changing at the scale it already had. New dining rooms are coming from people already here, and the one big development proposed for the road came back as a strip a fraction of its first size.
Cotto Took Over the Stockyard Space at Vinings Jubilee
Cotto Modern Italian opened at Vinings Jubilee in mid-to-late September. DiningOut gave the opening date as September 17, and it went into the space Stockyard Burgers & Bones used to fill. The new tenant and the old one are the same people. Chef Scott Kinsey and his wife, Alexis Kinsey, ran Stockyard there for nine years before switching the concept, according to Atlanta magazine.
The Kinseys' restaurant group, Fork U Concepts, also runs Taqueria Tsunami, Silla del Toro, and Forno Vero. They opened the first Cotto in Gainesville, Georgia, three years ago. Alexis Kinsey told Atlanta magazine why they brought it here:
"We have a very similar demographic in Vinings and thought Cotto would be great here."
If you ate at Stockyard, the room will look different. The couple moved the bar and took out the half walls to open up the dining room. They added arches, niches, and stucco wall coverings in neutral tones with olive-green accents. Seating is 75 inside and 40 on the open-air patio. The restaurant takes reservations and walk-ins.
Scott Kinsey, a former corporate chef for Macaroni Grill, runs the Vinings kitchen each night. The menu covers antipasti, pasta, mains, and 10-inch wood-fired pizzas, and most dishes are meant for sharing. Early favorites include gnocchi, pollo saltimbocca, and cacio e pepe. DiningOut also lists burrata, lasagna Bolognese, gnocchi with shrimp, and veal piccata. The wine list has 85 Italian bottles. One of the seasonal cocktails, Fly Me to the Moon, mixes vodka, lemon, apricot, Italicus, and amaro. Cotto serves dinner nightly and brunch on weekends.
The Jubilee directory may still list Cotto as "coming soon." It's open.
Cotto isn't the only change at the center this year. Vinings Jubilee advertised a Warby Parker grand opening for July 25, and the store has been open since. Both additions went into existing storefronts. Nothing new was built.
The Vinings Slope Corner Started as a Five-Story Plan
Across Paces Ferry Road, at the corner of Vinings Slope next to Hotel Indigo Atlanta – Vinings, the Shops at Vinings Ridge is still going up. The address is 2747 Paces Ferry Road. The project looks very different from the plan first announced for this site.
In May 2019, developer D&A Investment Group announced a five-story mixed-use project here, according to What Now Atlanta. Construction documents filed five years later described a much smaller building.
| 2019 announcement | 2024 construction documents | |
|---|---|---|
| Height | Five stories | One story |
| Total size | 300,000 sq ft | 17,155 sq ft |
| Retail | 30,000 sq ft | Up to 12 suites, 1,200 to 2,400 sq ft each |
| Homes | 300 apartments, 50 townhomes | None |
| Parking | Not specified | 112 spaces |
The building planned now is less than 6% of the size first announced, and the 350 homes in the first plan are gone. The Vinings Village HOA calls the revised project an upscale one-story retail center with restaurants and shops. It lists the zoning case as the "OB-29" revised site plan, approved in May 2024.
The corner went through the same change as the Jubilee storefronts, on a larger scale. A plan sized like Cumberland was cut to roughly the size of a village block.
Why the Completion Date Keeps Moving
The smaller building has still taken longer than expected. Here's the timeline from the Vinings Village HOA and local coverage:
- May 2019: D&A Investment Group announces the five-story mixed-use plan.
- May 2024: The revised one-story site plan is approved.
- September 2024: The AJC reports that Just Brunch, a popular Duluth restaurant, plans a Vinings location targeted for late 2025.
- November 2024: Groundbreaking, with about a year of construction expected.
- April 2026: The projected completion date passes.
- Now: The HOA's heading for the project reads "coming 2025 (now LATE 2026)."
As of October 5, 2026, none of the sources reviewed for this post confirm that any tenant has opened. ToNeTo Atlanta still called the center "upcoming" on September 28. Late 2026 is the latest public target. No tenant has posted its own opening date.
Who Has Signed On at Vinings Ridge
ToNeTo Atlanta's September 28 report lists five tenants for the center:
- Just Brunch. It was the first tenant announced and is still listed.
- Roti Modern Mediterranean. A fast-casual restaurant planned for a 1,200-square-foot space.
- Pacific Dental
- Allure Nail Bar
- FedEx Office
Like Cotto, Roti has local roots. The chain started in Chicago in 2007 and had 42 restaurants in six markets at its peak in 2020. It closed about a third of its locations in 2021 and filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2024. Atlanta private equity firm BroadPeak Capital bought it in 2025, and the company is now based in Sandy Springs. The Vinings store is one of three planned in metro Atlanta. The others are at Abernathy Square in Sandy Springs and Forsyth Town Center in Cumming.
The tenant list matches the building. A brunch spot, a fast-casual lunch counter, a dentist, a nail salon, and a print-and-ship store fit 1,200 to 2,400 square foot suites. They're the kind of errand stops a 300,000-square-foot complex would have put on its ground floor. Here they make up the whole building.
On the Calendar While You Wait
Vinings Jubilee's fall events are mostly in the same courtyard as Cotto:
- Thursdays, 2:30 to 6 p.m.: The Jubilee farmers market runs every Thursday during its season.
- Through November 3: HOBNOB Bourbon & Bites, which started September 9.
- October 23 to November 1: The Partners Card shopping and fundraising event.
- October 17 and 18: The first Cumberland Art Festival at Galleria on the Park, 100 Galleria Parkway. It's open 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday, with 125-plus artists, food, live entertainment, and a kids' zone.
Where the Bigger Projects Are Going
The large projects nearby are down the hill at Cumberland and the river. The $190 million expansion of Cobb Convention Center-Atlanta broke ground in September 2025 and is slated to finish in 2027. The Cumberland CID plans to start construction on Segment C of the Cumberland Sweep, a three-mile walking and biking corridor, along Galleria Drive in 2026. Completion is expected by 2028. At Paces Mill, the $9.5 million second phase of New Day Palisades would add a visitor center, pavilion, river access, and overlooks. The project's own website gives two start dates for that work, fall 2026 and fall 2027, so the start date is still open.
Along Paces Ferry Road, the changes this fall are smaller. The Kinseys turned their nine-year-old burger room into a 75-seat Italian dining room. A plan with 350 homes became a single-story building with five named tenants and a late-2026 target.
If you're weighing what these Paces Ferry Road changes mean for a home near Vinings Jubilee or Vinings Slope, Shanna Bradley follows these projects block by block and can tell you what's open, what's still under construction, and how it might affect your plans. Book an appointment and we'll go through it together.
