The Continued Evolution of Downtown Las Vegas

Apologies for the slightly supremely pretentious title, but sometimes excitement for cool new things is a valid excuse for pretentiousness.Or so I tell myself.

I've spent many, many reams of digital ink typing up my praises to Downtown Las Vegas as the neighborhood continues to grow from an empty lot filled mugging-zone where one would not dare spend time after dark away from the single large street of cheesy low stakes gambling parlors into the vibrant and interesting area filled with unique and cool local businesses its quickly becoming. Places like The Downtown Cocktail Room and The Griffin and events like First Fridays have thrived and encouraged the openings of distinct watering holes like Insert Coins, The Lady Silva,  Bar+Bistro, Artifice, Commonwealth, and resurrected classic Atomic Liquors, as well as hipster brunch spot Eat, quirky museums that illuminate the history of the Mob and Atomic Testing in Las Vegas, the soon to open (and surprisingly cool sounding) Shipping Container Park, coffee/vinyl/zine merchants The Beat Coffeehouse, world class cultural showcase The Smith Center... you get the idea. Basically, I'm trying to say that Downtown is pretty cool.

Clearly, Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh and Downtown Cocktail Room proprietor Michael Cornthwaite's masterplan to convert Downtown Las Vegas into a world-class neighborhood that will attract creative and artistic young people and innovative start-ups (as well as tourists looking for a more off-beat experience than The Strip can offer) to the area is already paying off, and will continue to do so. (Let's just pray that they're not trying to gather all of those people into one Downtown neighborhood in a relatively small city so that they can use their brains to power their brain-powered giant robots. I know this fear is far fetched, but we can't rule it out as a possibility, especially since Hsieh's massive investment of his own money is so generous that some sort of unseen ulterior motive may as yet be revealed.)

Downtown's evolution continues to roll on (to mix metaphors), as list of new businesses and projects are set to debut on or near Fremont Street in the next year or so. Below is a list of just a few #DTV coming attractions I'm most excited about.

The Velveteen Rabbit
Local sisters Pam and Christina Dylag are set to open their dream bar in Downtown as soon as construction finishes, and these crushable alt-chicks have a vision. Named after their favorite children's story, set to serve craft brews and cocktails, and promising to feature an imaginative and whimsical design inspired by its imaginative name (and teased on the bar's Facebook page), the place will most likely become an essential hipster mecca, frequented by Vegan-riding bicycle riders and haunted by food trucks just outside its doors, once it opens officially in 2013.


The Life is Beautiful Festival
No, it's not a weekend devoted to the Oscar-winning Robert Benigni concentration camp set tragi-comedy, but rather a music food and wine festival that promises to bring "arena sized acts" to Downtown in an event that's being organized by a powerful coalition, including the people behind San Francisco's popular answer to Coachella, Outside Lands, the marketing group behind First Fridays, and the guy who served as The Cosmopolitan's music director. Despite the terrible name and even though they have promised "arena-sized" artists, Life is Beautiful has the lot of potential to bring back a full-on music festival that's a little less corporate-driven than iHeart Radio to Las Vegas and features acts a little more interesting and outside-the-box than Lady Gaga or Usher (and which will hopefully be organized in a way that will lead to less diva-like onstage tantrums from mega-selling pop-stars who petulantly insist they're not Justin Bieber).

Bolt Barbers
The irreverent and dude-friendly barbershop, which gained some notoriety by promoting their bad reviews with a "people hate us on Yelp" flag that became so popular that they turned it into book form. Now the cutting-edge hair-cutters are moving to the Shipping Container Park in Las Vegas, in a converted train caboose. Obviously, this place could not be cooler, so get on the crazy train and score yourself a great new cut before you hit the bars on your next Vegas adventure.

Escape from Douchebaggery, Part 31: Eat

Nothing proves a city's true hipster credentials like a hip brunch spot with a minimalist name. I have no scientific, statistical proof of this claim, but I do have plenty of anecdotal evidence to support my thesis (something that uber-stat wonk Nate Silver would surely frown upon, using math-wizardry). To compliment places like Good in Silverlake, Home in Los Feliz, Gravy in Portland, Radish in San Francisco's Mission District, and Egg in Brooklyn (which has its own farm, of course), Downtown Las Vegas now has Eat.

Fed up with the corporate culture that came with working in Vegas kitchens for two decades, veteran Chef Natalie Young was about to move away to El Paso before Downtown Cocktail Room impresario Michael Cornthwaite recruited her, Avengers style, to stay in town and open her own restaurant. When Young protested that there was no way she could afford to open her own place, Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh swept in with his magic powers (read: money) to finance the brunch spot. With that, Eat was born.


Dedicated to filling a hole in the emerging but still slightly sparse dining scene in Downtown, Eat is a hip spot that serves inventive takes on American classics with a French twist. Eat's menu is designed to be hearty and healthy, with items made from sustainable, fresh, ingredients, with as many local and organic elements as humanly possible. So on the hipster brunch checklist, the restaurant hits pretty much all the right notes.

Eat is one of those places that really makes Downtown feel like a neighborhood with a thriving community, with art installations personally curated by Young, including large murals and wood sculptures on permanent display as well as rotating photographs and paintings from local artists. Natural woods, exposed bricks, and overhead lights with exposed light-bulbs give the place a funkily rustic vibe.

None of these cool features would be anything more than gimmicks if the food wasn't good, but thankfully the food at Eat is very, very good. Cornthwaite made the right call by keeping Chef Young in town, because her menu is pretty darn amazing. I ordered the Huevos Motulenos (2 over easy eggs with Red and Green Chili, Black Beans, Peas, Feta, and Sauteed Bananas served on warm Tortillas... yes, sauteed Bananas are part of that amazing dish), while my friends ordered Chicken Fried Steak and the Truffled Egg Sandwich.

We all shared bites of each other's meals (but only one bite each because none of us were particularly keen on giving away much of our amazing orders), and everything was ridiculously delicious (though I'm pretty convinced my meal won the day, if only for the friggin' Sauteed Bananas). For dessert, we split an order of fresh Beignets, served with Raspberry Jam and Vanilla Mascarpone. I love Beignets. I've been to Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans multiple times... and these were some of the best Beignets I've ever tasted. Eat's steamy and strong Coffee, which is always just as important an element to a good Brunch as the food itself, was served fresh in a French Press, which was a very nice touch.

As much as I love the runaway gluttony of a good (or even mediocre) Brunch Buffet, Eat is so perfectly executed that it's probably going to be my new go-to destination for Sunday Brunch on future Las Vegas weekends. Thank goodness Michael Cornthwaite was able to pull a Samuel L. Jackson and convince Chef Natalie Young to stay in Las Vegas and open Eat, which will surely become a staple of the burgeoning Downtown Las Vegas community for years to come.