Behind the bar hangs a painting in a classical Chinese style, made by the owner's father-in-law. It casts the bar as a stage, a nod to the Chinese opera house that occupied the address from 1893 to 1911, and it set the direction for everything that followed. The brand needed to stand on its own, yet work in concert with the established Chinese Tuxedo above it.
The opera theme continues into the cocktail program, which runs to twelve drinks, each named after a Chinese opera. The icon is drawn from the doorway set into the room, reduced to a flat graphic mark and used across the signage, coasters, and matches.
THE DRINKS TOOK THE STAGE
Each of the twelve cocktails has its own illustration, drawn by hand in a traditional Chinese style and matched to the opera it is named for. The illustrations take their cue from the painting behind the bar, and establish the menu as a work of art itself.
Opera House works because the room remembers what stood here. A theater became a bar, the bar became a stage, and the drinks became the performance. It is one place telling its own history back to the people sitting in it.
