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LondonHouse's Amazing Rooftop Bar Overlooking The Chicago River Is Now Open

By David Matthews | May 30, 2016 7:26am | Updated on June 6, 2016 10:52am
 Photos of the new rooftop bar atop the LondonHouse hotel. 
LondonHouse rooftop photos
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DOWNTOWN — One of the summer's most anticipated Downtown rooftops is here. 

The new rooftop bar crowning the LondonHouse Hotel on Michigan Avenue is now open. Billed as the city's first three-level rooftop, the bar atop the landmarked Beaux Arts tower at Michigan and Wacker Drive shows guests unmatched views of the Magnificent Mile and the Chicago River. 

"It's a fun environment with some of the best views of the city," Riley Huddleston, the bar's executive chef and beverage director, said. 

Called LH on 22, the rooftop seats about 190 and requires an online reservation. Seats for up to three people at the bar are free, while tables for four to six are $50 per person and tables for eight to 12 cost $100 per person. The rooftop is above an indoor 21st-floor bar called LH on 21, and in a few weeks the building's distinctive cupola can be reserved for private events starting at $1,000. 

The table reservation fees are deposits toward a guest's bill. 

The rooftop is part of a more than $80-million effort restoring the historic Michigan Avenue office tower into a 452-room hotel with a glassy high-rise next door. 


The LondonHouse Hotel. [DNAinfo/David Matthews]

LondonHouse, 85 E. Wacker Drive, takes its name from the first owner of the 1923 tower: the London Guaranty & Accident Co., an insurance company, as well as the London House jazz club that once occupied the building's ground floor.

Crain Communications and other office tenants filled the building until developer Oxford Capital Group acquired it in 2013. Oxford took out an $84-million construction loan to build the hotel before selling the property last month for $315 million, according to Crain's. At $697,000 per room, the price was the highest per-room ever paid for a Chicago hotel. The hotel plans to eventually add another restaurant and shops on the ground floor, a spokeswoman said.

Huddleston said the hotel's menu is "reimagined American cuisine" nodding toward the history of the tower built on the site of Fort Dearborn. Cocktails range from $12 to $18, and food includes smoked salmon tartare and duck fat fried chicken wings ($14). 

"We're trying to hit everything," Huddleston said. 

The rooftop is open from 2 p.m. to 12 a.m. daily, while LH on 21 will be open from 5 p.m. to 2 or 3 a.m. daily. Bridges, the hotel's lobby bar, is open from 7 a.m. to 1 a.m. LondonHouse will host a ribbon-cutting Wednesday after opening last week. 

Check the slideshow above or scroll down below for the rooftop's menu and more looks outside: 

LondonHouse food + drink menus


[Photos by DNAinfo/David Matthews]

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