(cityweekend.com)
Updated: 2008-03-03 15:43

In Bar & Cafe is a part of the Chinese drinking experience that draws more from the tea house tradition than from that of neon-drenched megaclubs.

By day, Beijing’s gray sun seeps in through skylights while the Carpenters and Lionel Richie croon soft rock lullabies. At night, the bar changes atmosphere with a poor selection of hip-hop. The comfortable upstairs loft, however, remains chill. Drinks are cheap with Qingdaos at 10 yuan and mixed drinks starting at 20 yuan. There is neither anything lacking nor particularly exciting about the drink menu.

The various coffees are better than most of the mixed drinks and run between 20 yuan and 35 yuan. The bar’s crowning achievement is perhaps that it doesn’t strive for anything too special.

There’s nothing loud or flashy to distract from the company (or laptop) you've arrived with, making In Bar & Cafe succeed when it wants to be a cafe, but falling short on atmosphere as a bar.

Blake Stone-Banks
Tel: 8402-2050
Address: Nanluoguxiang # 17-1.