December 2022
Features
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Best of Atlanta 2022: Readers’ Choice
We asked our readers to nominate their favorites in dozens of categories, and these 174 got the most votes.
Best of Atlanta 2022: Buy
Our 2022 Best of Atlanta picks for things you can buy—here’s where you’ll find cool books, plants, home decor, clothing, kids’ gear, gifts, and more.
Best of Atlanta 2022: Do
Our 2022 Best of Atlanta picks for things to do—here’s where you can play outside, take in art, nerd out, listen to music, roller skate, and more.
Best of Atlanta 2022: Drink
Our 2022 Best of Atlanta picks for all things beverage-related—here’s where you’ll find great cocktails (both alcoholic and nonalcoholic), coffee, beer, tea, wine, and more.
Best of Atlanta 2022: Eat
Our 2022 Best of Atlanta picks for all things food-related—here’s where you’ll find great pizza, sushi, seafood, chicken, cheese, cakes, and more.
Death and granite in Elberton, Georgia
Granite is one of the hardest rocks on Earth. Much of what is mined around the world is crushed for gravel or cut into countertops, sidewalk curbs, and building stones. But in Elberton, Georgia—where, 325 million years ago, a great mass of magma rose through the earth’s crust, cooled, and solidified—90 percent of the granite coming out of the area’s numerous quarries is crafted into cemetery memorials. One could say death keeps Elberton itself alive.
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The Connector
Is Waffle House Southern? A new book hashes out the diner’s cultural resonances
“Waffle House is much like the South itself,” says Ty Matejowsky—a straightforward enough observation, on its face. Everybody knows Waffle House is a Southern icon. But why?
How a pair of Atlantans created gourmet snacks for chickens
Dispatches from Atlanta and beyond. Also in this month’s edition: BYOB (buy your own bridge) and remembering Marshall Rancifer
Renowned designer Stephen Burks brings his novel vision of home furnishings to the High Museum
The pandemic was a time of reckoning for Brooklyn-based industrial designer and educator Stephen Burks, as it was for many. “We were forced to reexamine who we were as people, as a family, as a community,” he says. “We were confronting our domestic laws again.”
Is Atlanta losing out on millions of dollars in revenue each year in property taxes?
Local governments rely on property taxes to maintain infrastructure and provide public services—to fill potholes, pay schoolteachers, and build affordable housing. In Atlanta, funds always seem to come up short. Julian Bene—a retired management consultant who served on the board of Invest Atlanta, the city’s economic development agency—believes he knows one reason why: By his estimate, the city, county, and school system are being shorted millions of dollars a year by high-value commercial property owners not paying their fair share in property taxes.
Hundreds of aging Georgia dams sit upstream of homes and major roads—and are in urgent need of upgrade and repair
Georgia is home to the fourth-highest number of dams in the country: over 5,400. These dams dot the state—in backyards, near playgrounds, beside breweries. They are owned by individuals, homeowners associations, and state organizations. Over a third of the riskiest dams in the state are in the metro Atlanta area. Fulton, home to more than 1 million Georgians, has more high-hazard dams in poor condition than nearly any other county in the state.
The Bite
The verdict on 3 new Atlanta restaurants: Palo Santo, Mambo Zombi, and the Bite of Korea
A modern Mexican restaurant with style to spare, a funky Edgewood Avenue cocktail lounge, and Korean street food in Tucker.
Review: Dining at Mujo is pure joy
Mujo—easily the most refined spot to open in Atlanta in more than a decade—is luxury dining at its creative best.
5 bread dishes you need to try in metro Atlanta
Honey toast is one of the most dramatic makeovers you can give to a sandwich loaf, but certainly not the only one; stuffing comes to mind. But see also these preparations available at Atlanta-area restaurants, representing culinary traditions from around the world in which a little bit of bread gets transformed—by heat, by time, by a little special attention from the cook—into another masterpiece entirely.
The Goods
5 Reasons to love Tucker
Situated just outside I-285 at roughly 2 p.m. on the clockface of Atlanta’s Perimeter, Tucker has a long history.
Room Envy: A metal fireplace that “steels” the show
“Like stone and wood, metal is a material I feel should be incorporated into every project,” says interior designer Michael Habachy. For this Tuxedo Park house, a 25-foot-tall fireplace clad in steel gives the great room a dramatic focal point.
The fashion of the Imagine Music Festival
Last year, we photographed some of the incredible looks we spotted at the aquatic-themed celebration of all-things EDM. As this year’s Imagine Music Festival kicks off, let’s take a look back.
Miscellaneous
A love letter to a Pakistani clothing shop
Seconds off Jimmy Carter Boulevard in Norcross, a small shopping complex is filled with the usual strip mall staples: Kroger, Pizza Hut, GNC, a hair salon. But unless you were part of the Pakistani and Kashmiri immigrant scene, you would never know, or guess, that sandwiched between the GNC and the hair salon is J. Junaid Jamshed (or just J.), a Pakistani fashion retail store stocked with light, soft, warm weather–friendly clothes that are almost impossible to find elsewhere without paying a hefty price.
