The owners of an Atlanta all-in-one, high-end boutique restaurant, bar, bowling, and entertainment venue are looking to put their first non-Georgia location in downtown Greenville.
Justin Amick, co-owner of The Painted Pin in Atlanta’s Buckhead area, says he and his partner William Stallworth want Greenville to be the location of their first out-of-state location while they are also looking at Nashville, Charleston, S.C., and North Carolina for future sites.
“Greenville has a booming downtown,” Amick says. “It’s a vibrant, cool, great Southern town. We’ve known it was growing, and there’s so much potential. We want to be a part of it.”
Greenville’s first boutique bowling alley, Stone Pin Company, opened on Stone Avenue under event venue Revel earlier this month. It features six lanes and a bar menu in an industrial rustic atmosphere.
The three-year-old, 24,000-square-foot, and highly acclaimed Painted Pin features 20 full-service bowling lanes in an industrial warehouse space, along with classic interactive pub games such as indoor bocce courts, giant Jenga, Bimini ring game, two oversized basketball pop-a-shots, table shuffleboard, pingpong, Skee-Ball, and Southern Skittles.
“Basically, anything you can do with a craft beer or artisanal wine in your hand,” Amick says, describing the types of games available.
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The restaurant and bar offers shareable small plates, wood-fired Neapolitan-style pizzas, tacos, sliders, sandwiches, and salads, along with signature and classic cocktails, craft and local beer, and artisanal wines by the glass.
“We are a bar first and foremost,” Amick says.
The venue also features live music Thursday-Saturday.
“We’re a social gathering place for all age groups,” Amick says.
The venue is open seven days a week and starting at 5 p.m. each evening enforces a dress code of no athletic wear or excessively baggy clothing. Hats, headbands, and sunglasses are prohibited at all times.
The Painted Pin has received praise from Zagat (“10 Hottest Bars in Atlanta,” “10 Sexiest Places in Atlanta”) and Business Insider (“50 Coolest New Businesses in America”), among dozens of other regional and national publications.
Painted Hospitality, Amick and Stallworth’s hospitality group created in 2014, is also set to open the nearly 26,000-square-foot Painted Duck in the Westside area of Atlanta this fall, which is similar to The Painted Pin but offers vintage duckpin bowling, a variation of tenpin bowling that uses three-pound bowling balls, which are slightly larger than a softball and lack finger holes.
Amick says it’s possible the future Greenville location could be a Painted Duck concept, but that hasn’t been decided yet.
Amick comes from a family of restaurant operators. His father, Robert Amick, owner and founder of Concentrics Restaurants, has owned and operated restaurants nationally since 1974. Some of those include the Morton’s Steakhouse Group in the 1990s, along with a series of high-profile, chef-driven dining experiences in the prospering area of Midtown Atlanta. In May 2012, Amick launched The Spence with “Top Chef All-Stars” winner Richard Blais.
According to the Concetrics Restaurants website, the elder Amick’s upcoming projects include three concepts in Atlanta’s newly built Mercedes Benz Stadium; Dockery’s, a destination restaurant on Daniel Island in Charleston, S.C.; and an upscale restaurant, also located in Charleston.
The Painted Pin owner says he worked with his father for many years to learn the ropes of the restaurant industry.
Amick has been named “Best Sommlier” by Atlanta Magazine, holds a spot on The Atlanta Food and Wine Festival’s advisory council, and is the recipient of the prestigious Rudd Scholarship from the Court of Master Sommeliers, an award that honors the individual who received the highest combined score in the advanced sommelier exam.
Following his graduation from Tulane University in 2004, Amick worked for three years in nationally acclaimed chef Tom Colicchio’s New York Craft Restaurant’s management training program. He then relocated to the Napa Valley where he worked for the Trinchero Family Estates’ winemaking team.
Upon returning to Atlanta, he managed the restaurant Two Urban Licks and was general manager and beverage director for PARISH Foods & Goods and The Spence.
Amick says he eventually left Concentrics to launch his own concepts and start his own path, but with his extensive experience, he was prepared.
“We understand the synergy and décor in restaurants,” Amick says. “We’ve operated high-volume bars and restaurants for years.”
