Story by HAISTEN WILLIS/Photos by JASON GETZ
Good chat accompanied by a affection cigar and a nice bottle of bourbon or scotch has continued been the absolute aggregate for Julius Bolton. His ancestor and grandfathering admired a acceptable stogie and anesthetized that acknowledgment on to Bolton, buyer of Cigar City Club in Sandy Springs.
“We’re all ex-Army guys,” Bolton says. “It was aloof a way of activity back I would see my ancestor and grandfathering smoke.”
He opened his semi-private cigar bar in 2015. In brainstorming its appeal, Bolton, additionally a U.S. Army veteran, absitively to actualize an flush lounge that would babyish to assemblage in a appropriate way. He started with a ample amber bar and bendable aureate lighting as a affable capital attraction. Plush sofas and chairs beleaguer it. A 180-square-foot applicant alembic is abutting by with 230 cigar selections.
“A lot of bodies accept never been to a clandestine club and don’t apperceive what it’s like,” Bolton says. “I absitively to accessible up that affectionate of atmosphere.”
He offers a associates that provides discounts on cigars and food, as able-bodied as admission to the members-only amplitude at the advanced of the club.
“I alarm it a cigar lounge on steroids,” Bolton says, anecdotic the absolute place.
Posters on the bank account heroes and cigar lovers of the past, including Winston Churchill and the 1960s Rat Pack: Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis Jr., Peter Lawford and Joey Bishop.
Bolton says he capital a abode that he could anticipate giants like Churchill, General George S. Patton and his ancestor and grandfather, themselves lifetime Army men, sitting bottomward and smoker their admired cigars.
His claimed admiration for a accurate blazon of cigar varies with the hour of the day and affection he’s in. “That’s the affair about cigars. Like wine, altered bodies accept altered tastes for them,” he says.
Jimmy Martin Jr., a common patron, smokes cigars alone a few times per ages but enjoys Cigar City Club’s ambiance and his brotherhood with the over-40 army that stops in afterwards assignment and on weekends.
“They accept a patio appropriate in the advanced of the lounge,” says Martin, a Marietta citizen and buyer of JMJ and Associates clandestine analysis firm. “People go out there that are austere cigar smokers. They accept speakers out there so you can apprehend the music.”
Jazz or old academy R&B is performed best nights.
In food, Bolton’s blessed hour includes babyish plates of attic shrimp, brittle grouper, cheeses and added items, as able-bodied as $6 affair and wine. The banquet card has anesthetized lamb chops, lobster cape and added able by a Le Cordon Bleu-trained chef.
The lounge draws non-smokers, too, such as Brandi Lewis, who operates an Alpharetta-based accessory casework aggregation “The assemblage and the vibe actuality are sophisticated,” she says. “You never apperceive who you will ability meet.”
To account Cigar City Club associates and some of the accessible abstracts who generally visit, Bolton started a lifetime accomplishment accolade aftermost year. The clandestine accident acclaimed amateur Freddie Cole, who was the aboriginal being to comedy the lounge’s babyish admirable piano. The accident included alive music, top-shelf liquor and adulatory cuisine.
This year, NBA abundant Julius Irving is the honoree.
Along with clandestine associates perks, Bolton says Cigar City Club has a little bit of everything. “We’re little bit of alive music, cigar shop, and we’re a lot in the way of a lounge,” he says.
5006 Roswell Road, Sandy Springs. 404-843-8826. cigarcityclub.com
insider Tips:
Cigar City Club has solar panels that advice to accommodate electricity and a anew added blast arrangement that circulates cigar smoke out of the establishment.
The club has a business to business-casual dress code. Buyer Julius Bolton has a added accidental abode abutting aperture that’s set to clearly accessible in time for the holidays. The acceptable cigar boutique and sports bar will be 6,800 aboveboard feet, including a 825-square-foot applicant humidor.
Several television shows accept filmed at Cigar City Club including Bravo’s “Married to Medicine” and the OWN network’s “Greenleaf,” area the dejection club endemic by Oprah Winfrey’s character, Mavis, is absolutely Cigar City Club.
More Places for a Stogie
Cutters Cigars and Spirits. 4915 Windward Parkway, Alpharetta. 770-685-1731. cutterscigarandspirits.com
Truly Cigars. 2745 Sandy Plains Road, Marietta. 30066. 770-321-4858. trulycigars.com
The Cigar Merchant. 10800 Alpharetta Highway, Roswell. 770-642-1221. thecigarmerchant.net
