Sonny’s Hideaway

Call it gentrification or hipsterfication or even welcome change. However you parse it, Highland Park is one of L.A.’s rapidly morphing neighborhoods, with new shops, bars and restaurants popping up all along York Blvd. The neighborhood’s reputation as a serious cocktail destination grew tremendously with the 2012 arrival of Sonny’s Hideaway—a moody, dark wood-and-leather bar helmed by Austin import J. Kelly O’Hare. The long mirrored wall behind the counter is stocked with a comprehensive collection of aperitifs and liqueurs, which explains the staff’s pride in creating lower alcohol cocktails like the Campari Cobbler or the Jane made with gin and Cynar. The bread and butter of the bar’s repertoire, though, is found in formidable renditions of stern and serious cocktails like the Blood and Sand, the Brooklyn and the Corpse Reviver, along with original drinks that lean boozy.