When Jenna Carol opens Winedown, the new wine and beer lounge planned for 118 State St., she doesn’t want it to be “just another bar on State Street.”
Amid a throng of watering holes that cater to an exuberant college-age crowd, Carol hopes her establishment will offer a more relaxed, “upscale but not stuffy” atmosphere, where young professionals, graduate students and state workers can come to gather to wind down over drinks, board games and live music from local musicians.
“I’m really going for a living room type lounge,” she says. “You go in and you feel like you’re at a friend’s house.”
Carol, a 29-year-old entrepreneur, also owns Express Yourself Dance Studio at 401 Lake St., an “all abilities” school whose classes draw a number of students who fit Winedown’s intended customer demographic.
“Most of the people in the dance studio are young professionals, and we like to go out and have a drink or two,” she says. “But places around us are geared toward a college or sports crowd — which is fantastic — but for people like us, where can we go?”
Winedown has a tentative opening date of Saturday, July 11, pending approval from the city’s Alcohol License Review Committee. Carol plans to serve a rotating variety of wines and beers, as well as specialty cocktails made with wine and beer.
Carol says that Winedown will be Madison’s “first and only bar” serving frozen wine and beer — a slushy treat whose formula and consistency she says she perfected through “lots of patience.” She plans to offer red and white wines on tap as a frozen base for customers to blend with fruit reductions to create sangria drinks.
The frozen beer is slightly different — instead of a full beer slushy, customers can top a 12- or 16-ounce brew of their choice with a “frozen beer cap,” which Carol says will likely be something light, like an ale or a pilsner, which would blend well with darker beers.
“The [frozen] beer will likely change as we feel our audience out,” she says.
Windown will also serve food, but the offerings will be “minimal” — local breads, jams and cheeses. Carol is planning a variety of daily specials, including “bagels and booze” on Saturday mornings from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. with unlimited mimosas or “beermosas,” regular or frozen.
Winedown is taking over the former home of Diego’s Mexican Bistro, which closed in January of this year. Diego’s former owner, Mohamed A. Barketallah, tried several other restaurant concepts in the space over the years, including Moe’s Tavern and Zander’s Capitol Grill.
Winedown is Carol’s first foray into the food and beverage industry, but she hopes her concept will have staying power in the neighborhood and fit in well with the other businesses in the area.
Planned hours will be 4:45 to 11 p.m. Mondays through Thursdays, 4:45 to 11:30 p.m. on Fridays and 11:30 a.m. to 11:30 p.m. Saturdays, so if patrons aren’t quite ready to call it a night after last call, they can head to another nearby establishment, Carol says. Sunday hours will be 12:30 to 8:30 p.m.
“The focus isn’t necessarily on the drinking aspect as much as it is on the community,” Carol says. “We really want it to be a place for people to come and connect.”
