Slutty Vegan owner expanding plant-based empire with Ponce City Market bar

Pinky Cole, the owner of popular plant-based Atlanta burger spot Slutty Vegan, is opening a new concept inside mixed-use development Ponce City Market.

Bar Vegan will make its home on the second floor of Ponce City Market’s Central Food Hall, Atlanta Business Chronicle first reported. The space was previously occupied by the Mercury, which shuttered last year.

Slutty Vegan business manager Angel Barnwell described Bar Vegan as having a “very traditional Slutty Vegan kind of feel, with a bar,” with the intention of serving beer, wine and liquor.

An opening date has not been announced.

The news comes in a year of rapid expansion for Cole, who opened a Slutty Vegan open in Old Fourth Ward in October and a location in Jonesboro in July. A Slutty Vegan location is also planned for Birmingham, Alabama.

Slutty Vegan opened its brick-and-mortar location in the West End neighborhood in early 2019 after operating for several months as a mobile food truck.

The restaurant quickly drew lines snaking down the block, offering a plant-based burger and fries menu with suggestive concoctions like the Ménage à Trois, a vegan patty loaded with vegan bacon and shrimp, and a messy mix of lettuce, tomato and special sauce.

Slutty Vegan also quickly became a fan of high-profile figures, including Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms, Tyler Perry, Tamar Braxton, actress Taraji P. Henson, Da Brat and T.I.

Cole has been involved in several community initiatives through her Pinky Cole Foundation, including bringing Slutty Vegan burgers to National Church Residences senior care facility, offering jobs to juvenile offenders and paying the tuition of 30 Clark Atlanta University students.

Bar Vegan is the latest announced planned opening in Ponce City Market, which is owned by Jamestown LP and is working on expanding its Central Food Hall by reworking former office and retail space to provide around 2,000 square-feet, including four kiosks and a bar. The expansion proposal calls for adding half a million square feet of new development and amenities to the existing two million square feet.