Bar High Five

The experience

Hidetsugu Ueno's basement cocktail bar off Ginza 5-chome, a small wooden counter with a handful of seats and no music to speak of. It has never printed a menu: bartenders ask what you like and what mood you are in, then build to that, with ice hand-carved at the bar. It has appeared on The World's 50 Best Bars list every year since 2011, peaked at number three in 2013, and took the Heering Legend of the List award in 2020.

One of the most decorated cocktail counters in the world, still a twelve-seat room where the owner is usually behind the bar.

What a membership adds.

Everything above is free: the name, the photo, the rating, the exact spot. What members get is the part you can't Google: the sourced insider tip for this place (what to order, when to go, what to skip), every day of your trips unlocked in full with the insider tip on every researched stop, and the concierge at full strength, answering with your own insider tips, no daily meter.