A NEW YORK BAR WITH A JAPANESE SOUL.

BAR GOTO is an intimate Lower East Side drinking den that blends Japanese tradition and New York bar culture. Open on Eldridge Street since 2015, warm amber lighting and a framed bolt of silk kimono fabric from bartender-owner Kenta Goto’s family in Tokyo keep the atmosphere personal and inviting. The focus is on exceptional cocktails, a snackable food menu, and relaxed, welcoming service.

The Goto team expanded to Brooklyn with BAR GOTO NIBAN in 2020. Located on Bergen Street in Park Slope (near Barclays Center), the cocktail bar's minimal storefront hides a striking interior. Guests can choose to sit at the extra-long walnut bar top, tables at the window banquette, or enjoy a drink and a bite at the drink rail. A hand painted mural of a Japanese garden scene on gold spans nearly 40 feet and serves as an anchor to the sleek, wood paneled space.

Both bars are open Tuesday through Sunday and are walk-in only; complete parties are seated first come, first served.

"For a lot of knowledgeable drinkers in New York, Goto has become the go-to." -Esquire, Best Bars in America 2017

"[Bar Goto] was one of the first of a new generation of Japanese-American style cocktail bars in New York and it remains one of the best, simultaneously friendly and formal, with every drink on the menu ringing the bell. Niban is just as good, with a more relaxed Brooklyn vibe." -Robert Simonson, The New York Bar 50

"Kenta Goto’s Sakura Martini is an undisputed classic of the modern cocktail scene, one of the few drinks invented in New York in this century that has a good chance of lasting into the next.

...At both locations you can eat celery sticks dressed with shio kombu, the single most compelling treatment of raw celery in existence."  -Pete Wells, The New York Times

⚲ 245 Eldridge St, New York, NY [BAR GOTO]
⚲ 474 Bergen St, Brooklyn, NY [BAR GOTO NIBAN]

BAR GOTO/BAR GOTO NIBAN 2024.