M Bar opens with pledge to restore Auburn Avenue

? When Damian Gordon and his business partners stood in front of M Bar to cut the red ribbon Wednesday evening, it represented not just a grand opening but a grand vision. Atlanta City Councilman Andre Dickens and council member C.T. Martin were on-hand to present an M Bar Day proclamation from the city of Atlanta in honor of Gordon's pledge to help restore the historic Auburn Avenue district to the greatness it once represented for Atlanta's black community. 
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? This is also the second coming for M Bar, which helped spark the rebirth of Castleberry Hill about a decade ago when it opened in its original location on Peters Street. As Gordon saw that neighborhood's nightlife scene jump the shark, he eventually closed. But he's been working on bringing M Bar back on Auburn Avenue for a few years. A commercial builder and engineer by day, he renovated the space beneath the historic Royal Peacock himself with plans to open an adjacent members-only bar called Swig. 
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? He gave me a tour of the location last summer while I was reporting on the area for the eventual story, "Searching for Sweet Auburn." It was all two-by-fours and sawdust at the time. But he could clearly see the finished product as he pointed out the future VIP area, performance stage, and bar banquette. "You remember the movie Idlewild?" he asked me, referring to the OutKast flick set in a 1930s-era speakeasy. "That's what this is. That is the actual feeling I want you to have when you walk in here. Custom drinks, button chairs, really nice comfortable chairs at the bar." 
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? Gordon was equally motivated at the time to restore Auburn Avenue. "A lot of this stuff has been maintained by the old regime for so long, they don't understand that in order to change or repopulate this area you're going to have to allow the new generation to come in," he told me. "And it doesn't necessarily have to be all black. The basis and the root of this space is African-American, but we can get all types of folks down to Auburn Avenue."
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? Swig hasn't opened yet. But M Bar is officially back in business. It joins Sweet Auburn Seafood, directly across the street, which was also under construction last summer. A few blocks down the street at the former Black Lion Cafe (253 Auburn Ave.), RHOA house-husband Peter Bailey's future Bar One location is supposedly still under renovation. Some of the shops that participated in Central Atlanta Progress' temporary pop-up program — including Byrd's Box, ModernTribe, and Just Add Honey — have since become permanent proprietors. Restoring the historic district has been the talk of the town for decades. It's still a far cry from the Sweet Auburn's heyday, but modern Rome wasn't rebuilt in a day.
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