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Enter the Moongate Lounge for Lofty Cocktails and Dim Sum Above Chinatown

The space above Mister Jiu’s is now a swanky lounge

Moongate Lounge is hitting the Chinatown scene with dim sum and cocktails served in a swanky salon. Its owners, chef Brandon Jew and partner Anna Lee, are also the proprietors of Mister Jiu’s, the Michelin-starred restaurant located one floor below.

The lounge, however, is intended to provide the hip crowd that frequents Mister Jiu’s a place to stay a little longer, hang with friends and snack on Jew’s Chinese-Californian menu. Drinks, from Danny Louie and Alex Kulick, are based on the Chinese lunar calendar; the wine list from wine director Louisa Smith is all natural wine (for Moon Gate’s purposes, this means organic and/or biodynamic practices with no additions in the wine, other than little to no sulphur), with bottles ranging from $40-60. There’ll also be a selection of “bottle service,” which is hard-to-find or very expensive liquors available by the ounce.

Before its most recent rebirth, the entire building housed the Four Seas restaurant — Moongate Lounge’s floor was reserved as the banquet hall. “It was always a banquet room, a place that people celebrated in,” Jew told Eater last year when the plans were announced. “My uncle got married up there, we had a lot of celebrations here as a kid. We want to reopen it as a place to have those kinds of celebrations.”

Now its a mid-century Chinatown vision from Steph Wong-Swig Architects and Anna Lee. A large mural, preserved from its original time as a banquet hall, has been restored in the main dining area; original brass pendants hang from the ceiling. High ceilings with the building’s original redwood beams on display will also showcase the restaurant’s biggest decorative component: a take on a traditional moon gate (an architectural component in Chinese gardens), also inspired by the work of artist James Turrell.

Moon Gate Lounge opens to the public tomorrow, March 2, from 5 p.m.- midnight.

Velvet booths below original brass pendants at Moon Gate Lounge
Patricia Chang

Lounge seating
An mural from the Four Seas era has been restored, and looks over the dining room
A door in Moongate Lounge leads to a balcony with views of San Francisco’s Chinatown
A circular ode to moon gates, overlooking San Francisco
Patricia Chang

kerberos gin, green chartreuse, salted kiwi, celery, pink peppercorn
deimos: bourbon, oolong, green walnut, brined black sesame honey
Titan : scotch, barolo chinato, lapsang sochoung, toasted brown rice
Patricia Chang
sao rum, coconut, plum wine, fino sherry, curacao, hawthorne
A reimagined “bottle service” offers tableside pours of rare liquors by the ounce.
Smoked oyster ‘youtiao’
Grain rain: rye, goji berry, cherry heering, szechuan, flamed orange
“Chicken in a space suit”
Patricia Chang

Mister Jiu's

28 Waverly Place, , CA 94108 (415) 857-9688 Visit Website
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