Retro Basement Bar Joins Downtown LA’s Growing Vintage Cocktail Scene

A new throwback basement bar is coming to Downtown’s 8th Street corridor soon. The place is to be called Grandma’s Cabinet, and it lands below street level inside the ageless Bristol Hotel building.

Not much is known about the new bar so far, outside of a standalone Instagram page that’s mostly showing some renovation work and uncovering old details about the building. The place seems primed to be a lounge-y kind of bar filled with vintage detail work and, if the name is to be believed, more than few tchotchkes and curios. Eater reached out to co-owner Mel Satsuma to discuss more details, but so far they’ve declined to speak further on the bar, including an opening date outside of sometime this year.

Regardless, the bar should add some more charm to the dramatically different 8th Street stretch, which is now buffeted by a Whole Foods, Shake Shack, the Freehand Hotel, and Cassell’s right next door, not to mention mainstays like Colori Kitchen and Ham & Eggs Tavern.

The arrival of Grandma’s Cabinet also coincides with something of a throwback bar renaissance in Downtown Los Angeles of late, from the reborn Rhythm Room to Birds & Bees and even tiki-themed hideaway Pacific Seas. More recently the Wolves opened inside the historic Alexandria Hotel as a Victorian-era Parisian cocktail den that’s flooded with vintage touches.

Grandma’s Cabinet. 425 W. 8th St., Los Angeles, CA.

• A Stunning Parisian Salon-Styled Cocktail Bar Opens in Downtown LA [ELA]