The patio guide to Charlotte

Charlotte has roughly eight months of patio weather and spends two of them complaining about pollen. That still leaves half a year where the best seat in any restaurant is outside, and this guide is where to find it. It’s organized by the kind of outdoors you want: a lawn, a roof, a lake or a porch. Facts about each place come from its own listing or site unless we say otherwise.

The lawn

The Olde Mecklenburg Brewery has an eight-acre beer garden, per its site, which makes it less a patio than a park with beer. Kids run, dogs sniff, adults sit at long tables under trees, and the German-style beer is built for drinking outside in the heat. Our read: the best outdoor drinking space in the metro, and it isn’t close. NoDa Brewing Company has a beer garden too, smaller and more urban, in the neighborhood it’s named for. 760 Craft Works in Huntersville runs a family- and pet-friendly beer garden with wine and non-alcoholic options alongside its own beer, which makes it the lawn for the mixed group.

The roof

Overflow in Mooresville has rooftop seating over a 70-tap self-pour taproom, with live music. A roof in Mooresville sounds modest until you’re on it at sunset with a pour card. The Scorpio in South End, North Carolina’s oldest gay club by its own account, has a Rooftop and a Veranda among its four rooms, and they’re the reason to arrive before the dance floor fills.

The lake

Lake Norman is the patio capital of the region and the reason South Charlotte drives 40 minutes north on a Saturday. LakeHouse Wine Bar & Grill in Cornelius is open year-round on the water with indoor and outdoor seating, steaks, seafood and cocktails. BoatYard Lake Norman was built on the site of an old boatyard and runs live music Thursday through Sunday; it’s a bar and a lawn and a dock. The Cabin at Davidson Landing is a lakeside bar with live entertainment and a smaller crowd. All three fill on summer weekends and empty on weekday afternoons, which is when the locals go.

Down at the other lake, Lake Wylie Pins N’ Wins is a family entertainment center just off the shore with bowling, an arcade and a bar; not a patio, but the closest thing to a full afternoon out for a family on the southwest side.

The city patio

flora on South Boulevard is a New American restaurant with seasonal dishes and cocktails, and the South Boulevard patio is the point on a spring evening. It takes reservations, which you’ll want. Fogo de Chão on South Tryon in South End does fire-roasted churrasco with tableside service; the outdoor seating is secondary to the meat, but it’s there. And Mexilove on South Tryon pairs tacos with what it calls ice-cold margaritas, a phrase that means more in July.

The porch

Front Porch and Provisions in Dallas has the porch in its name and a general store behind it, with breakfast from 8 to 11 a.m. and Riverbend Creamery ice cream in the cooler. A porch is a slower patio. This is the one for a Saturday morning with nowhere to be.

The vineyard

Kefi Vineyards & Winery in Monroe is an estate winery, first vintage 2018, making Mediterranean-style wines. Drinking wine within sight of the vines it came from is the original patio, and it’s 40 minutes from Uptown. Bring a designated driver and a blanket.

The village

Birkdale Village in Huntersville is an outdoor shopping and restaurant district with events including Taste of Birkdale Village and Sunday markets. Half its restaurants have patios facing the same lawn, so it’s the place to go when you want to sit outside and haven’t decided where. Walk the loop, pick the table with the shade.

The bar patios in the ring towns

Every ring town has a bar with a back patio that its residents consider the best in the region, and they’re usually half right. Two Buck Saloon in Mint Hill parks food trucks outside its country bar, so the patio is where dinner is. Shep’s Bar & Grill on Fairview Road in Mint Hill stays open until 11 on Fridays and Saturdays, later than most of that side of town. Christopher’s Grill and Bar in Clover is a family sports bar with a game-day crowd that spills outside in football season. And Bubba’s Bunkhouse in Harrisburg is the go-to, by its own description, for a lively dinner or a place to unwind with friends, which in Harrisburg means outside.

Patio season, honestly

March and April are pollen; wipe the table. May through June is the best stretch. July and August are for the lake and the roof, where there’s a breeze, and for the beer garden after 6. September and October are the second spring, and the lake bars stay busy through Halloween. November is a coin flip; the porch in Dallas and the beer garden’s fire pits carry it. Most of the places above keep heaters running into December, and a few, LakeHouse among them, are open outside all year. Check the heater situation before you book an outdoor table after Thanksgiving.

We’ve left out the chain patios and the hotel rooftops on purpose; you’ll find those without us. If your favorite outdoor table is missing, send it in, and the restaurants directory has the rest by town.