Novela

Novela opened on Mission Street in 2014 from the Future Bars Group, the same team behind Bourbon & Branch and Local Edition. The concept is straightforward in a way few cocktail concepts are: every drink on the menu is named after a fictional character, and the menu is laid out as a literary index. The drinks themselves are not gimmicks — they are full classical builds with the character’s background quietly informing the choice of spirit, modifier and accent.

The room is what visiting bartenders remember. Twenty-foot ceilings, an exposed-brick library wall lined with books to the rafters, a long copper bar, banquettes in leather. Sean Quigley designed it to feel like a New York hotel library transplanted to SoMa. The back-bar spirits library runs over six hundred bottles — among the deepest of any cocktail bar in California — and the bartenders treat the back bar as a working tool rather than a display.

The Holden Caulfield (rye, sherry, walnut bitters) is the order regulars name when asked. The Don Quixote (mezcal, lime, agave) reaches further into the menu. The crowd is a mix of SoMa tech workers on weeknights, theatre-goers from the Yerba Buena complex two blocks south at weekends, and a steady undercurrent of visiting industry bartenders. Walk-ins until 7pm; reservations through OpenTable for the weekend rooms.