The Upscale Experience

It seems Lebanese restaurateurs will be forever enamored with downtown Beirut, despite the roller coaster ride the area has put them through. It all started in the 1950s when the Burj area was buzzing with fashionable people and restaurants, only to be destroyed by the Civil War. Following the reconstruction of Downtown in the early 2000s, this love affair was rekindled with the cluster of restaurants in Nejmeh Square which again ultimately shut down. Restaurant operators continued to move from one street to another in Downtown, including Uruguay Street and Zaitunay Bay, with the latest restaurants to hit the area of Minet El Hosn, next to Starco’s lower entrance and in between Phoenicia and Beirut Souks. That location, which had been languishing with little footfall or activity, now welcomes swanky Lebanese who like to see and be seen in any one of these restaurant’s terraces or through their wide glass walls.