Carmel-by-the-Sea's Next Kitchens Are Moving Into Its Oldest Rooms

On the last Wednesday of September, a city public works crew loaded a forge onto a backhoe at 511 Junipero Avenue. To get it out, they had to take down part of a wall. The forge was heavy enough to break a couple of wheels on the dolly. Then it went up the hill to the garage of Flanders Mansion, on the edge of Mission Trail park, where it is now stored. The Carmel Pine Cone reported the move in its October 2 edition.

The forge came out to make room for Corner Market, the casual restaurant chef Justin Cogley and partner Janet Elarmo are building in the old Forge in the Forest. Corner Market is one of five food and drink projects going into Carmel-by-the-Sea rooms that already have a history. Only one of them is open. The others arrive one at a time, through the holidays and into 2027. Taken together, they show a village rebuilding its everyday places, room by room, and the people behind them say they have residents in mind.

The Forge Went First

The building at Junipero and Fifth started as a blacksmith shop. Francis Whitaker, the Carmel blacksmith whose death in 1999 was reported in The New York Times, got a permit in October 1944 for builder Hugh Comstock to put up his shop there. The Pine Cone's account draws on historical consultant Meg Clovis's analysis. Whitaker was born in Massachusetts in 1906, studied under the architectural blacksmith Samuel Yellin, and came to Carmel in 1927.

The Forge in the Forest restaurant closed in 2025 after more than 50 years, when its owners could not extend the lease. The San Francisco Chronicle reported that Corner Market had been in the works for two years and will cover 5,000 square feet. It will serve lunch and dinner, with an emphasis on seafood and seasonal produce. Cogley spent the past 15 years at Aubergine, where the tasting menu runs $285 and about 20 guests a night sit for three hours. He told the Chronicle, "I've always wanted to have a casual restaurant and eat the food that I like to make at home."

He also knows what the building means to people. "I know there's a lot of local attachment to it," he said in the same Chronicle piece. That attachment came out at City Hall this fall. Remodeling permits were issued in November 2025 with no objections. Once work started on the patio and siding came off part of the north wall, the city received a run of inquiries from the public. Residents asked about the artifacts, a plaque and the town's heritage. Clovis concluded the building was eligible for listing because of Whitaker but had not kept enough integrity to require protection.

The objects got a more careful ending than the walls. The Carmel Heritage Society was offered the forge and declined because of its size and weight, so the city took it. Cogley and Elarmo said they would install a plaque honoring Whitaker. Whether the forge itself ever belonged to Whitaker is still in question, and no one involved knows where the anvil is. Corner Market's projected opening is 2027.

One Room Is Already Pouring

Two blocks over, the change has already happened. Sade's Cocktails, the nearly century-old bar on Lincoln Street, closed on January 30, 2026, after its operators could not reach a new lease agreement. Monterey County Now covered the closing.

Its replacement is BashBar, at 654 Lincoln St. It opened without fanfare in September. Bashar Alsneeh, who founded the Dametra group and also runs Porta Bella, Catch and Char, is behind it. The Pine Cone listed the hours as noon to 2 a.m. daily, and the bar's own site says noon until late. Either way, it is one of very few places in town that stays open late and admits only guests 21 and over. Signature cocktails run $14 to $18. The list includes a boilermaker made with Bulleit bourbon and a beer, a bourbon sour with Maker's Mark, and a spicy mule with Smirnoff tamarind vodka.

Edible Monterey Bay's visit in late September found faux gold brick on the walls, paintings of vintage race cars and credit cards accepted. The glass out front says the bar wants to be known as "the community well." That goal sets the bar for every project in this post. Each new owner is taking over a room people already go to, and each one is asking them to keep coming back.

Built for the People Who Live Here

Anthony and Alissa Carnazzo say so outright. The couple behind The Stationæry are turning a two-building former attorney's office on Dolores Street, north of Fifth Avenue, into two businesses. Mammone, in the rear building, will serve southern coastal Italian food family-style. Mama's Boy, in the front, will be a neighborhood deli. The Planning Commission approved permits for both unanimously in February, including a water allocation, the Pine Cone reported. Executive chef Amalia Scatena will oversee the food at both.

The rooms help explain the plan. According to the Chronicle, the original owners built the rear building to look like a house, planning to retire there. It has working fireplaces in the bar and the dining room, and a wine library and private dining room will go upstairs. Out front, sandwiches will come on fresh schiacciata, and staff will make pasta in a "fishbowl" station facing the street.

"We're building them for the people that live here, and then the visitors want to be there because the locals made it cool," Alissa Carnazzo told the San Francisco Chronicle. "We're not building businesses that are dependent on tourists." The numbers she sees every day make that a deliberate bet. The Chronicle reported that for most of the year, The Stationæry's customers are about 60% locals and 40% visitors, and the split reverses in summer. According to Visit Carmel, visitor spending funds 60% of the city's annual budget.

The Chronicle and KSBW both projected 2027 openings for Mammone and Mama's Boy, while a WhatNow report on Mammone listed the restaurant for 2026.

The Two Closest to Opening

The nearest of the new kitchens sits on the corner of Sixth Avenue and San Carlos Street, under a tall palm. The building held Affina, then Edwin's, which closed in June. Ashley Wolff, who opened Jeju Kitchen in Carmel Plaza in late 2023, has the keys and is building Banju there. Edible Monterey Bay reported in August that she had wanted the spot for years. "It's my ultimate life's dream," she said.

Banju will be a brunch restaurant. Wolff described the food as "more lunchy than breakfasty," about 80% California cuisine and 20% Korean-Hawaiian, built on dishes people remember from the 1990s and 2000s. She was born in Seoul and grew up on the Monterey Peninsula, and she said the restaurant should feel familiar to Carmel locals. The drinks list will include beer and wine, sparkling wine from Scott Caraccioli, coffee, a matcha program and spritzers with and without alcohol. Planned hours are 9 a.m. to 3 p.m., which leaves evenings open for guest chefs and pop-ups. In August her target was sometime in November, before the holidays. The account to watch is @banjucarmel.

A smaller arrival is scheduled behind it. Small Batch Jam Co., based in Pacifica, makes around 80 hand-made jams along with marmalades, conserves, fruit butters and syrups. Owner Pablo Lugones plans a shop at 438 7th Ave. and hopes to open in early December, "final permits permitting," Monterey County Now reported on October 15.

The Calendar, Room by Room

Here is where each project stood in late October 2026. Every date except BashBar's is the owner's projection.

The pace matches what Gian Pepe sees from behind the counter at Carmel Bakery, which has been open since 1899 and was the town's first food business. Pepe told the Chronicle that he sees the newcomers as competition, and that a rising tide lifts all boats. "It's the most ambitious the town has felt in decades," he said. Brunch at the corner with the palm is the next date on the list, followed by jam on 7th Avenue in December. Whitaker's old shop is projected for 2027, and until then his forge stays in the garage at Flanders Mansion.

Many of Carmel-by-the-Sea's cottages and storefronts carry a history as long as these, and a building's past often shapes what it becomes next. If you own one of those places and are thinking about its next chapter, Michele Altman would be glad to talk it through, quietly and on your timeline. Let's Connect.