Nob Hill has a new bar at 1548 California St. It's called Olde Fashioned, and owner Will Herrera told the San Francisco Standard he designed it to look like a bar would if the Victorian era had never ended. It has a copper bar top, mismatched globe lights, lots of bric-a-brac, and a Negroni served in a flowered teacup with a gold rim.
A long line of bars
The space was most recently the dance bar Zhuzh, and before that Soda Popinski's. The Standard reported it was a tavern called Traveler in the 1960s, and Herrera thinks it may have been a bar for its whole history. He kept Zhuzh's floral wallpaper and skylights. The brass footrail came from Eddie Rickenbacker's, the downtown motorcycle bar that closed in 2019.
The menu
The opening menu is short: three wines, four beers and six classic cocktails, from a daiquiri to a Sazerac and an old-fashioned. "The whole point is to eliminate the pretense of a prototypical cocktail bar," Herrera told the Standard. He plans to add house cocktails after he gets to know the neighborhood.
Herrera also co-owns Harlan Records, the downtown listening bar that opened in 2022. The Standard said Olde Fashioned planned its official opening, and its outdoor sign, for late October. The bar's website lists hours of 5 p.m. to midnight and says longer hours are coming soon.