Social Kitchen pulls dining renovation plans

By Grace Lovin

After being denied a variance request by the Birmingham Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA), Social Kitchen & Bar, 225 E. Maple, withdrew its application for a special land use permit amendment from the city commission before the start of the Monday, April 21, meeting.

Social Kitchen, a Birmingham staple in operation since 2012, is in the process of designing a new outdoor dining patio to replace the current one on the east side of the building. The new design featured an aluminum pergola with a roof and glass transom, which goes against the city’s outdoor dining ordinance.

The bistro’s plans also showed that they would have an excess seat count on the outdoor dining patio of 21 seats. As a bistro, outdoor dining seats are limited to 65 seats per bistro, but Social’s plans showed 86 seats in the dining patio.

While at the planning board level, board members recommended approval of Social’s new patio to the city commission on the condition that the bistro obtain two variances from the BZA, or that the roof and transom be removed from the designs and the seat count drops to 65 seats. Social went before the BZA on March 24, 2025, and was denied variances for both the excess seats and outdoor dining enclosure.

Social withdrew its application for the final site plan and design review of the outdoor dining patio before Monday’s meeting, and as such commissioners did not review the item further.