New York on Tap 2008
Archive · modern edition Every bar New York on Tap knew, as it stood around 2008, with a 2026 check on each one. This page in the 2008 edition

No photo of this bar survives from the 2008 site.

Highbar

251 W. 48th St. · btwn 7th & 8th Ave
Midtown West, Manhattan

In 2026

Closed; now Bar Sprezzatura

Checked October 15, 2026.

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Overview

This roof deck bar is far enough away from Times Square to lose the view, but close enough to attract a crowd of tourists and midtown middle management. Cocktails start at $16 -- they've got to pay for that ICrave design somehow.

History

The daybeds weren't going to pay for themselves

Highbar dressed its roof at 251 West 48th Street, at Eighth Avenue, with canopied daybeds, striped couches and alabaster candles1. It was an indoor-outdoor lounge from Greg Brier, the owner of Aspen, designed by ICrave2. Our old review had cocktails starting at sixteen dollars, which had to pay for that design somehow.

The roof also rented out for events, with a DJ booth and an advanced sound system, and it held as many as 300 guests2.

By 2016 a rooftop lounge called the Attic Rooftop, formerly known as XVI, had a terrace overlooking the corner of 48th and Eighth3. Today the roof belongs to Bar Sprezzatura, the rooftop bar of the Kimpton Theta New York – Times Square at 251 West 48th Street, where the hotel promotes seasonal spritzes4, 5.

Sources

  1. publishersweekly.com
  2. directory.bizbash.com
  3. cititour.com
  4. barsprezzaturanyc.com
  5. hoteltheta.com

Researched October 2026.

What's nearby