The block you walked last October is not the block you'll walk this October. Between January and April, four rooms on or just off the Square either opened, reopened, or changed identity, and one long-anticipated project got cancelled outright. That matters because the two biggest fall weekends land inside a two-block radius, and where you eat, park, and duck in for a glass of wine between chalk squares now runs on a different map than the one in your head.
This post is a routing guide, not a discovery list. You already know the Square. What you may not know is which door is worth ducking into between festival stops, and which weekend is the one to actually plan around.
Two events carry the season, and they land back to back.
October 10 and 11: Chalktoberfest. Free and open to the public, 10 am to 5 pm Saturday and 11 am to 5 pm Sunday, presented by the Marietta Cobb Museum of Art. The chalk art, live music, and vendor market are free. The paid piece is the Craft Beer Festival, which runs Saturday only from 12 to 5 pm and includes unlimited samples of 120+ craft beers, seltzers, ciders, and 25+ wines, plus a souvenir tasting cup. Two things residents should file away: this event sells out every year, and gate-day tickets run $55, so the "we'll decide Saturday morning" plan is the expensive plan. Second, Chalktoberfest has grown to attract over 80,000 people to Marietta Square. If you live within walking distance, this is a walk-in weekend, not a drive-in weekend.
October 17: HarvestFest and Scarecrows In The Square. Saturday, October 17, 2026 from 9 am to 5 pm. The mechanics are worth knowing before you show up with kids. The event closes with a pet costume contest at 3 pm, and this year features a Pie Eating Contest for participants aged 6 and older, run in partnership with Pie Bar on the Square. The Scarecrows In The Square competition is showcased throughout Glover Park during the festival, and Cornerback's Coop on East Park Square runs a college football watch area where you can bring chairs and grab food from local vendors. The football detail is the one out-of-towners miss. It's why Marietta parents can hand the kids off to the scarecrow trail and still catch a first half.
One quiet planning note: the Marietta Square Farmers Market is not an official part of HarvestFest, but it runs the same morning from 9 am to noon in the parking lot across the railroad tracks from the Marietta Welcome Center at 25 Mill Street. Stack them. Coffee, produce, scarecrows, pie contest, football, in that order.
Here is where the block genuinely changed. If you are the friend who tells out-of-town guests where to eat, your mental list needs an update.
| Address | What it was | What it is now (2026) |
|---|---|---|
| 45 W. Park Sq. | Piastra (closed Dec 31, 2025) | Asher & Rose Modern Grocers |
| 29 W. Park Sq. | Red Hare Brewing & Distilling | West Park Sports Club |
| Church Street | New buildout | Deep Roots Wine Market & Tasting Room |
| 113 Church Street | Spring (closed for renovations) | Spring 2nd Branch, reopened in limited capacity |
| 77 N. Park Sq. (the "Goldstein Gap") | Approved for Ted's Montana Grill | Still vacant. Project cancelled. |
Four short readings on what each change means for a Saturday night.
Asher & Rose Modern Grocers is not Piastra with a new sign. After a decade on Marietta Square, Piastra shifted into a market-and-café setup under the same mother-son ownership of Chef Greg Lipman and Betty Bahl, with a grand reopening as Asher & Rose Grocers on January 28, 2026. The shelves carry fresh produce, regional dairy and cheeses, dry goods, plus a butcher shop with customized cuts of meat and fish, alongside prepared meals and a café menu. Translation for residents: the block that used to be a special-occasion reservation is now a Thursday errand with a wine list.
West Park Sports Club filled the Red Hare space in April. It opened on April 20, 2026, in the former Red Hare Brewing & Distilling space at 29 West Park Square as an upscale sports bar with plenty of TVs, a darker interior, leather seating, and a menu that mixes bar food with polished small plates like crispy rice with tuna, crab rangoon flatbread, and bulgogi cheesesteak sliders. The operator is Fork U Concepts, the restaurant group behind Taqueria Tsunami and Stockyard Burgers and Bones. The practical read: HarvestFest's football watch on East Park Square has a natural overflow room one block west now.
Deep Roots Wine Market & Tasting Room officially opened on March 17, 2026, giving the Square a dedicated tasting room in addition to the wine and cocktail programs at Asher & Rose and the existing bar rooms. If you were the household that used to drive to Buckhead for a proper flight, that trip is now a walk.
Spring 2nd Branch. Acclaimed Marietta fine-dining restaurant Spring, which shut down last year for renovations, announced in April 2026 that it has reopened in a limited capacity. Spring is Chef Brian So's Michelin-starred room, and its return, even in a soft form, restores the top of the Square's dining pyramid. The casual concept operates on a walk-in-only basis. Walk-in-only is the piece to remember when Chalktoberfest crowds compress reservation windows across the block.
The Goldstein Gap is the negative-space story. The Marietta City Council had considered a request to construct a building in the vacant lot of 77 North Park Square to house a Ted's Montana Grill, with the design already approved by the Marietta Historic Board of Review, then the project fell apart. The lot has sat vacant since the former councilman razed the Cuthbertson building on the site in 2010. Sixteen years is a long run for one of the most quoted lots on the Square. If you built a mental picture of a working restaurant there for fall, revise it back to a fence.
One departure worth logging so your recommendations stay current: Heavenly BBQ announced it would permanently close on Sunday, March 1, 2026.
Between the two big festivals, the season has its own quieter rhythm.
For anyone treating this as a walk-in weekend, skip ahead. For the rest:
Two parking decks are located at Waddell and Haynes Street, and another deck is at Mill Street and North Marietta Parkway, with additional spaces and curbside parking around the railroad tracks. Parking fees may apply, and some roads will be closed for the festival.
Two mistakes to avoid. First, do not aim for a curb spot on Park Square during Chalktoberfest Saturday afternoon. That is a chalk canvas, not a road. Second, if you are heading to the Farmers Market on HarvestFest morning, the Mill Street deck is your friend. It puts you steps from the market and a short walk from Glover Park without threading festival barricades.
Fall on the Square used to be about discovering what was on. In 2026 it's about routing around what changed. The events are stable. The rooms between them are not. Knowing that Piastra is now a butcher counter, that Red Hare is now a sports bar, that Spring is quietly back, and that the Goldstein Gap is still a fence, is the difference between an evening that flows and one that ends in a text asking where everyone is.
If you're weighing a bigger move than dinner, whether that's a first purchase near the Square or trading up somewhere quieter in Cobb, Connie Carlson and the Carlson Orange Team live and work three minutes from Glover Park. Talk to Your Real Estate Family when you're ready. We'll route the rest.
