Sandlot Opens a Second Outdoor Bar to Bring Black-Owned Food Businesses Into Georgetown

The shipping container bar with cold-pressed juice cocktails arrives near the Four Seasons

by Gabe Hiatt May 6, 2021, 12:37pm EDT

Sandlot, the outdoor shipping container bar that takes over vacant lots and provides resources for Black-owned food businesses to gain exposure in new neighborhoods, opened a new setup on Thursday, May 6th in Georgetown. That space adds to Sandlot Southeast, which debuted in Navy Yard with a lineup of cold-pressed juice cocktails in October 2020.

Sandlot Georgetown takes over a lot adjacent to the Four Seasons hotel that used to house a gas station. It opens at 4 p.m. Thursdays and Fridays and noon Saturdays and Sundays. There’s room for 120 outdoor seats, including Adirondack chairs that face Pennsylvania Avenue NW.

An UberEats sponsorship that funds rent-free access to cooking facilities for a rotating group of Black-owned restaurants, catering businesses, and food trucks extends to Northwest branch. That includes funding a dedicated Sandlot food truck. Catering company Grub Rockstar will be cooking out of the truck this weekend.

D.C. juice bar Turning Natural collaborated on cocktails named after colors at Sandlot Southeast. Ian Callender, a Co-founder in the Sandlot Program who serves as an artist member on D.C.’s Commission on Nightlife and Culture, says the owners of Baltimore-based Gangster Vegan and soon to be DC-based and neighboring juice bar Rawish are providing the juice for three new flavors in Georgetown. There’s a Purple (apple, ginger, lemon, beet, Effen vodka), an Orange (pineapple, carrot, orange, apple, lemon, Hornitos tequila), and a Pink (strawberry, apple, pineapple, lemon, Bacardi rum).

Prepaid reservations secured on Tock range from $25, for two cocktails and complimentary Uncle Chip’s cookies, to a $350 bottle service package that covers up to ten people over two and a half hours. As of May 1, D.C. allows bars to host live music outdoors. Callender says he’s working to try and bring in some DJs with the promise to Georgetown officials that it won’t be a party atmosphere.

Callender, who owns event design firm Suite Nation, says he’s been talking with the Georgetown BID about collaborating since 2017. He says Sandlot met resistance from the Old Georgetown Board because the shipping container bars didn’t meet the tony neighborhood’s aesthetic. Eventually, Sandlot was able to secure approval through the end of 2021.