Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
Hidden Gems & Odd Finds picks in New York City.
- Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
A Victorian Parlor Hidden Behind a Doorbell in Chelsea
There is a brass doorbell on West 17th Street that most people walk past. They're looking for a sign, or a menu in the window, or any other signal that something is here. There is none. You ring the bell and you wait — and the decision to do so is already the whole point.
- Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
A Speakeasy Hidden Behind a Hot Dog Stand on St. Mark's Place
Inside a hot dog shop on St. Mark's Place, there is a wooden phone booth, a rotary telephone, and a handset you dial by pressing "1." A wall opens. Since May 2007, PDT — Please Don't Tell — has been what happens next, and why a generation of bars decided that hiding their entrances was worth the trouble.
- Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
A Hi-Fi Listening Bar Built to Sound Like the Inside of a Speaker
Eavesdrop is a 1,000-square-foot listening bar in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, designed from the studs out like a recording studio. Baltic birch plywood lines the ceiling, walls, and shelving — not for aesthetics, but to make the room sound right. The bartender doesn't hand you a menu. He asks what you feel like tonight. And the general understanding about keeping your voice down? The room enforces it better than any sign on the wall.
- Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
A Tesla-Themed Speakeasy Behind a NoMad Coffee Counter
On West 27th Street between Sixth Avenue and Broadway, a narrow coffee counter serves espresso until late afternoon. At 5pm, the lights drop, a host appears at the back, and a door that has gone unused all day opens into Patent Pending — a cocktail bar built inside the basement of the building where Nikola Tesla lived in the 1890s and ran his first long-distance wireless receiver on the roof. The drinks are named after his experiments. Most speakeasy façades are bits; this one happens to be the address.
- Hidden Gems & Odd Finds
A Bar with No Menu, Since 2013
Attaboy has no menu. You tell the bartender what kind of night you're having, and they build the mood into a cocktail. Here's how the system actually works, and the three drinks we talked our way into.
