Our Story
A building
with memory.
Kutaisi Bazaar started as one question. What would it look like if someone actually cared about this city, this building, and the people who come through the door?
Our Story
Kutaisi Bazaar started as one question. What would it look like if someone actually cared about this city, this building, and the people who come through the door?
The Building
The building sat empty for eleven years. Before that it was a trading house, then a Soviet-era office, then nothing at all. We found it in 2021 through a friend who had grown up nearby and always wondered what was inside.
The renovation took two and a half years. We worked with local craftsmen. The stone walls were cleaned and left exposed. The original floor tiles in three of the rooms were kept exactly as they were. The ceilings went up. The street-facing windows came back to their original size.
Nothing was bulldozed. Everything that was interesting was kept.
The Philosophy
We are not trying to compete with Tbilisi. Kutaisi has its own thing going on. The city is getting attention now but it is still itself. We wanted to make something that fits here, not something transplanted from somewhere else.
Eight rooms is a choice. We could have built more. We did not want more. Smaller means we actually know what is happening. The food comes from people we know. The wines come from producers we have visited. The bar is run by someone who grew up two streets away.
Everything that could be local is local.
"We wanted to make something that belonged here. Not a hotel that happened to be in Kutaisi."
How We Got Here
We first walked through the space in March. The roof had partially collapsed in one wing. We said yes anyway.
Local craftsmen start on the stonework. We find the original floor tiles under three layers of linoleum in what becomes the Merchant Suite.
Giorgi joins the team. The bar concept develops around Georgian natural wine and local spirits. The courtyard gets its first table.
Eight rooms. One bar. A courtyard. We open in May with no press release. Word spreads anyway.
The People
Grew up in Kutaisi. Worked in hotels in Tbilisi and Istanbul for eight years before coming back to open this one. Knows every wine maker in the region by first name.
Architect by training. Handled the entire restoration design. She decided which tiles stayed and which walls came down. Mostly tiles stayed.
Grew up two streets from here. Self-taught. Does things with chacha that should not be possible. The Bazaar Sour is entirely his invention and we are not touching it.