Down the Stairs on Market Street
You reach Local Edition by descending a staircase off Market Street, just before Third, that announces very little. The bar opened in 2012 in the basement of the Hearst Building — a building the Hearst Corporation still owns — on the exact footprint where the San Francisco Examiner once ran its print operations. The ceiling is high, the floors are dark hardwood, and the room has the proportions of a space that used to be industrial.
Future Bars, the San Francisco group that also created Bourbon and Branch and Rickhouse, built it out without erasing what was there. The printing equipment stayed. The archive came down from storage. The bar used the history rather than simulating it, which is a harder thing to do than it sounds when your building is literally Hearst's.
The Marble That Came from San Simeon
The bar tops and some of the tables at Local Edition are surfaced with marble that was originally intended for Hearst Castle in San Simeon — the same William Randolph Hearst who owned the Examiner and the building above. Steve Hearst, the founder's grandson, was involved in the project from the beginning and opened the family's newspaper archives to the bar.
This is not a design flourish. The marble is here because the connection between the building, the newspaper, and the Hearst family is the building's actual history, not a mood board. It makes the room feel less like a themed cocktail lounge and more like something that happened because the building knew what it used to be, and someone was paying attention.
What the Presses Left Behind
The original printing press rollers and equipment line the floor along the walls — large iron forms that were once functional and read now like industrial sculpture. Vintage typewriters sit on shelves behind the bar. Pre-1970s papers from the Chronicle, early issues of the SF Guardian, and the Examiner itself are framed under glass along the walls. The archive covers more than a century of the city: the 1906 earthquake, the political decade of the 1960s, the slow contraction of print.
Being in the room where that archive now hangs is a particular kind of reading. You're not being told about San Francisco's newspaper years; you're inside the physical space where they ended. The papers on the wall were printed somewhere very close to where your drink is sitting.
Cocktails Named for Deadlines
The menu follows its environment. The Chief, named for Hearst himself, pairs vanilla sarsaparilla syrup with bourbon, soda, and an orange twist — a long drink that sits at the intersection of soda fountain and saloon, which is a historically accurate intersection for San Francisco. The Evening Journal combines rye, orange curacao, lime, and house yerba maté syrup, served with sparkling wine on the side.
The bar group behind Local Edition describes its cocktail philosophy as recovering what was lost between the 1960s and the craft revival: spirit-forward drinks, simple in structure, built on the assumption that the base spirit is the point. The Local Edition Jazz Orchestra plays every Tuesday, which is either very on-brand for a bar named after a newspaper, or simply a fact about what the room sounds best with.
The Best Window in the Week
Local Edition opens at 4:30pm on weekdays. The Thursday window between opening and about 5:30 — before the Financial District empties out and before anyone has decided this is a night — is the room at its most itself. The press equipment catches the amber light. The newspapers on the wall are quiet. The jazz doesn't start until later, and the bar stools are open.
There's something useful about a bar that has a subject. The room is about something specific: the Examiner, the Hearst connection, San Francisco's print years, the glamour of deadline culture before it collapsed. That makes the bar easy to be in, even alone. The room does most of the work; the cocktail does the rest.
Practical notes
- Address: 691 Market St, basement level (entrance via stairs just before 3rd St), San Francisco, CA 94105
- Hours: Monday 4:30pm–12am; Tuesday–Wednesday 4:30pm–1am; Thursday–Friday 4:30pm–2am; Saturday 6pm–2am; closed Sunday
- Getting there: BART/Muni Montgomery St station is one block away
- What to order: The Chief (bourbon, vanilla sarsaparilla, soda, orange twist). The Evening Journal for a rye option.
- Best window: Thursday 4:30–5:30pm, just after doors open. Bar stools available, room is quiet.
- Live music: The Local Edition Jazz Orchestra plays every Tuesday, no cover.
- What to do after: Walk north on Kearny St toward Columbus Ave and North Beach. Vesuvio is roughly fifteen minutes on foot.
The Point
Most bars that claim a historical identity are selling you a costume. Local Edition is the actual room — the basement where the Examiner's presses ran, with Hearst's marble on the bar and his newspaper archive on the walls. You order the bourbon named for the man who built the building, in the building he built, and it tastes like exactly what it is.
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Sources consulted: localeditionsf.com · futurebars.com · timeout.com · theperfectspotsf.com · sfstation.com
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Please drink responsibly. Must be of legal drinking age.
