Best Little Warehouse in Chicago
Soho House Group is renowned for artfully preserving original features and lacing their spaces with references to the local destinations. The luxury in their lower-key environments comes from the quality of the food and the relaxed-but-professional service. This is exemplified in the sixth-floor Rooftop Restaurant at Soho House Chicago just off the city’s Restaurant Row.
Words: Juliet Kinsman
J
102
ust west of Chicago Loop, Illinois’
Chicago is celebrated as a culinary world
central commercial downtown district,
leader these days, so it is important that the
Fulton Market is fast becoming the
menu appears effortlessly cool, yet is still
hippest part of town. Reminiscent of
impressive and reasonably priced. There’s an
New York’s Meatpacking District – once a
Italian accent in the lighter, shareable salads
low-rise sprawl of wholesale butchers, now a
and pizzas all served fit for Instagram. (You’ll
hub of creative studios and loft spaces – Soho
need to snap surreptitiously though. This is
House Club is one of the addresses heralding
Soho House: photography is strictly verboten.)
a new era for the Midwest’s equivalent, which
Whereas many restaurants in Chicago offer
was recently landmarked. Nowhere is Chicago’s
full-on fare, here on the Rooftop the menu is
charismatic skyline better appreciated in
fresh and seasonal. Chef Alexis Rorabaugh is at
panorama than here from the top-floor terrace
the helm of the Club Floor kitchen and she’s a
of the 1907-built six-story former Chicago
master of that ‘zeitgeisty’ style that discerning
Belting Factory which is now a 40-room hotel
consumers crave today where there’s a
with two public restaurants and two floors of
blurring of the lines between formal and rustic.
members club spaces.
Locally sourced ingredients are used to create