28 Degrees
1 Appleton Street, 617-728-0728
www.28degrees-boston.com
28 Degrees is a bar that shimmers with flashy cocktails, a flashy circular bar and an even flashier party going on inside. There are Bellinis, pomegranate cosmos and Herradura tequila and Cointreau margaritas to be downed with a mixed crowd of Euro-students, chic-beyond-belief adults and neighborhood regulars. This bar alone fills Boston’s glamour quotient.
Toro
1704 Washington Street, 617-536-4300
Toro is a Barcelona-inspired tapas restaurant that is hopping. The interior is simple and modern with whitewashed brick walls and large mirrors. The high bar stools at the communal table are the best seats to take in the action as you drink sassafras mojitos and caipirinhas with caramelized limes.
Or pick a Spanish Rioja from the four-page wine list — the wine is served in giant tumblers.
Order the Pincho sampler (a chef’s selection of small bites) that the chef, Ken Oringer, a former winner of a James Beard Award, prepares using a flaming brick oven.
Everything at Toro tastes smoky, including the pan con tomate, a Spanish dish of grilled bread rubbed with tomato, garlic, olive oil and salt; and don’t pass up the foie gras with rhubarb and strawberries.
SoWa, a strip of blocks south of Washington Street, is where you’ll find Boston’s emerging artists. Try both the 450 Harrison Building and the artists’ studios at 500 Harrison Avenue, which is open to the public on the first Friday of each month all summer. (Check for times at www.sowaartwalk.com.)
The city’s art scene has shifted to Harrison from Newbury Street, says Bernard Toale, whose Toale Gallery has been at 450 Harrison since 1992 (617-482-2477; www.bernardtoalegallery.com).
“The art and the clientele in the South End is younger and funkier,” he says. “First Fridays are big happening scenes, with a younger, urban, new South End crowd. I’ve been around a long time, but I’d say the South End is made up of a lot of younger galleries showing newer artists, and not just local artists.”
The Butcher Shop
552 Tremont Street, 617-423-4800
www.thebutchershopboston.com
You can buy meat and racks of lamb from small local producers, artisanal cheeses and a range of handmade sausages. Don’t leave without ordering the magnificent Hot Dog à la Maison: a bratwurst made downstairs, cooked with Gruyère and served with rosemary potato chips. The Butcher Shop opened two years ago but still feels like a local secret.
It’s open every day, 11 a.m. to 11 p.m. or midnight.
Pet Shop Girls
12 Union Park Street, 617-262-7387
www.thepetshopgirls.com
Passing by Pet Shop Girls, you’re likely to see two neighborhood Great Danes outside the window lunging at Pedro Bandito, the cat who sits inside taunting the dogs of Union Park.
The shop itself is a bakery that makes dog birthday cakes from carob and yogurt. If your four-footed companion is being especially well behaved, you might treat him to a doggie garlic bagel for 99 cents.
Aunt Sadie’s Candlestix
18 Union Park Street, 617-357-7117
www.auntsadiesonline.com
Aunt Sadie’s Candlestix is a home store that has floors painted white, cocktail napkins displayed in a round-topped Philco refrigerator from the 1950’s, a section for urban men that sells Dean Martin CD’s and another room with piles of stuffed frogs for kids.
Sooki
505 Tremont Street, 617-536-080
www.sookiboston.com
Sooki is a women’s clothing shop where Jesse, a border collie who belongs to the shop’s owner, Suzan Griffith, will herd you inside from the sidewalk with lots of friendly licks; it’s also the kind of place that will excite the most jaded cosmopolitan shopper.
Sooki sells many cool things, including one-of-a-kind dresses from boutique designers in France and Japan.
Cyclorama @ Boston Center for the Arts
539 Tremont Street, 617-426-5000
www.bcaonline.org
Catch an avant-garde art exhibition or a contemporary play at the Cyclorama. This 23,000-square-foot rotunda is part of the Boston Center for the Arts, and also offers a range of community events and is home to the Community Music Center of Boston, the Boston Ballet Costume Shop, three small theaters and a rehearsal studio.
Boston Convention and Exhibition Center
415 Summer Street, 617-954-2000
www.mccahome.com
The 1.6 million-square-foot convention and exhibition center was designed by Rafael Viñoly. It has become a magnet for developers. Old industrial buildings in the surrounding blocks are being turned into office buildings and condos. There are even plans for a luxury hotel.
Flour Bakery + Café
12 Farnsworth Street, 617-338-4333
www.flourbakery.com
Flour Bakery & Cafe is a small sandwich and pastry shop that serves pain aux raisins ($2.50) for breakfast and made-to-order salads for lunch. It opened behind the just-expanded and just-reopened Boston Children’s Museum (300 Congress Street, 617-426-8855; www.bostonkids.org), known for its science playgrounds and hands-on activities.