Comments (0) Best Place for a Martini With a View (1914) - 2010
Yamashiro
Want to feel like the King of Hollywood? More specifically, want to feel like the Japanese King of Hollywood? Technically that would make you emperor. Or do you just want to chill out in one of L.A.'s most opulent and fortuitously situated restaurant/lounges? Do all of the above at Yamashiro, a decent Japanese restaurant and drinking establishment blessed with an absolutely incredible setting. In 1914 the Bernheimer brothers finished their wacky dream of building a Japanese mansion on a hill high up above Hollywood, and filled it with their Asian treasures. Today you can get a martini or a rare sake in the lounge or a truffle hamachi in the Cal-Asian-style restaurant, and take in the incredible minipalace, with its gold-lacquered, bronze dragon–tipped rafters, ornate woodwork and silk wallpaper, and outdoor grounds featuring a 600-year-old pagoda, thousands of specially planted trees and shrubs, Japanese gardens, a koi-filled pond and an inner courtyard. Just watch the extremely steep drive going up and down. 1999 N. Sycamore Ave., Hlywd. (323) 466-5125, yamashirorestaurant.com. —Adam Gropman
