Leave it to one of Echo Park’s liveliest restaurants to amp up the fun with a secret bar. The owners of the neighborhood’s vibrant, neon-lit Thai destination, Sticky Rice, quietly launched a music venue and cocktail hub this fall, accessible through their restaurant’s unmarked curtain in the dining room.
Make your way through that red curtain and you’ll find yourself in Spirit House, a dark and moody bar with Thai flourishes and a penchant for DJ sets and local bands. The new spot comes to us by way of restaurateurs David Tewasart and Bryan Sharafkhah-Sharp, who’ve intentionally neglected many of the cocktail classics—martinis, old-fashioneds and the like—for Thai-inspired tipples and a well-rounded rum program.
A few bar stalwarts do get an upgrade, such as the pandan sour, which adds pandan leaf and house-made coconut cordial to the citrusy, frothy-topped gin drink; the sabai fizz, which gives the carbonated concoction a dose of rum, lime juice, coconut cream, coconut milk and lime leaf; and their take on the gimlet, which involves Thai-tea–infused gin, lime juice, house orgeat and lime leaf.
The more straightforward classics they do offer lean tiki, with options like the mai tai and the painkiller, plus their own Tiki Territory, which gets made with rum, banana liqueur, house-made coffee liqueur, pineapple, orange and lime.
There’s music just about every night of the week, with residencies peppered in: You can catch blues artist Rocco DeLuca on Tuesdays; jazz drummer Kyle Crane on Thursdays; and DJ Jungle Gym Records on Sundays. Keep your eyes on Spirit Room’s social for announcements on other live shows and events.
Sadly, while Spirit House is separated by a single red curtain from some of the best food in Echo Park, there’s no dining service in the bar aside from a bowl of Thai peanut mix. But never you worry: Sticky Rice is open until midnight most nights of the week—and until 2am on Fridays and Saturdays—which means it’ll always be there for you after a night of, oh, three or four of those Thai-inspired cocktails.
Spirit House is open within Echo Park’s Sticky Rice, located at 1801 Sunset Blvd, and keeps hours of 6pm to midnight Sunday to Thursday, and 6pm to 2am Friday and Saturday.