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People&Culture

New York City Cocktail Bars

Pravda

Soviet swank spiked with vodka and caviar.

The Scene

Having fallen from its place on the hot list serves this clandestine underground lounge and its imported-vodka devotees well. Without pressure to impress, its dramatic interior casts a much warmer glow. Moscow mementos and Cyrillic scrawlings are just a stylistic footnote to well-loved leather club chairs, tiny tables and a golden ceiling that arches low--as if you're holed up inside a loaf of baking bread. The patrons are no longer model-slammin' gorgeous, but fans and friends still flock.

The Draw

Get politically charged with custom concoctions like the Leninade (citrus vodka, grenadine, lemon juice and mint) or a passion fruit-flavored Bohemian. Regulars sample Russian vodkas as well as those from Poland, the Ukraine and more than 10 other countries where the liquor has long served as equal parts anesthetic and social ritual. Here it mixes smoothly with caviar, fat cigars and drinks priced as if rubles grow on trees.

281 Lafayette St
New York, NY 10012
Phone: (212) 334-5015