The Best Places in the United States

Frank Lloyd Wright built Taliesin West as his own desert home and studio, and a UNESCO World Heritage Site is about as far as you can get from a velvet-rope museum. Docent-led walking tours cover the office, a private home theater, and a collection of Asian art, with the McDowell Mountains as the backdrop. Evening tours run too, if the afternoon heat is uninviting. Workshops and rotating exhibitions go deeper into Wright's philosophy for the genuinely curious.

Film still on the shelves is the first clue that this isn't a big-box camera department pretending to care. Tempe Camera is an old-school camera shop and repair house where the staff are all photographers, happy to talk you through a lens decision without making you feel like a tourist. Downstairs handles repairs, sensor cleanings, and gear rentals. They also run workshops if you're still figuring out what half the buttons do.

The Cafe at Thistle Farms is a daytime counter-service cafe on Charlotte Pike, run by a nonprofit that employs women survivors of trafficking, addiction, and prostitution, so the sandwich arrives with a mission statement attached. A teacup chandelier hangs overhead, and the menu leans toward BLTs, breakfast bowls, and a case of cakes. Nashville Scene named it Best Cafe in its 2023 Best of Nashville, if that helps you decide on lunch.

Tucked under the historic Daniels & Fisher Clock Tower, this variety nightclub runs the full spectrum from burlesque and drag to stand-up and live music, sometimes in the same week. The European-style room is dim and intimate enough for a date, loud and loose enough for a bachelorette party, which about covers the range of people you'll find there. A full bar keeps things moving. Shows run Wednesday through Saturday.

The Duce is part-bar, part-gym, part-vintage trailer diner, part-dance hall, which sounds like a fever dream but somehow holds together. You can swing dance, throw a punch in the boxing area, browse vintage goods, and still find time for a pot pie and an old-school cocktail, all under one roof. Ping-pong and shuffleboard are there if you need to justify the drinks as cardio. Phoenix has plenty of bars, but few with this particular range of excuses to stay.

A bar that closes at ten, and that's the whole point. The Joy Lush Club is a low-key neighborhood wine and beer bar with 16 taps, a serious wine list, live music, and food trucks rotating through. You can even take a bottle home on your way out. It draws the kind of crowd that wants a proper drink without the performance of a late night. Think comfortable chairs, zero pretension, and somewhere to be by morning.

Sticky floors, cheap drinks, and a back patio where beer pong and giant Jenga coexist peacefully: Monkey Bar is a no-frills dive that has held its ground in Denver's Santa Fe art district as everything around it got progressively fancier. Darts, pool, ping-pong, foosball, N64, and four-person Pac-Man are all free to play, first-come basis. Dogs are welcome, and the house move when someone loses is apparently a round of pickle shots.

No signage in the lobby, no floor indicator in the elevator, just the sound of a crowd spilling out when the fifth-floor doors open. The Pub at Thunderbird is a full bar on a Thunderbird School of Global Management campus, open to the public on weekdays, with alumni spirits behind the bar, a rooftop with downtown Phoenix views, and Thursday nights where students and professors share a table like it's the most normal thing in the world.

A dachshund-shaped iron toilet paper holder is the kind of thing that ends up in somebody's bathroom forever, and it came from a strip mall next to a Kohl's in Ahwatukee. Vintageous is a vintage furniture and decor shop with a well-curated rotation of midcentury modern pieces, old denim, and oddball gifts, all spread across a roomy, easy-to-navigate floor rather than the usual tchotchke labyrinth.

A 190-foot-long mural running along Adams Street between First and Second, painted by local artist Kayla Newnam. Gila monsters, saguaros, and mountain ranges roll across the wall in bold desert colors under a painted sunset that takes up most of the sky. Newnam opened two community paint days during the process, so a fair number of Phoenicians had a hand in it. The Phoenix New Times named it Best Mural in 2023.

A half-day on the Salt River for the price of a decent lunch is the pitch at WildHorse Paddleboards, a Mesa outfit that rents boards by the half or full day. The owner's enthusiasm for Arizona's waterways is the kind that turns a transaction into an orientation, so first-timers leave knowing more than which end to stand on. A solid way to spend a Sunday without committing to garage storage.

A 9,000-square-foot taproom with a basketball court tends to set expectations, and Wonderland Brewing's beer menu swings just as wide, running from Belgian-style and barrel-aged English ales to high-IBU IPAs and wild sours. The Broomfield brewery keeps a permanent food truck on-site, so there's no rush to leave, which is convenient given that there's also ping-pong. A good place to spend a longer afternoon than you planned.

Xico has been anchoring Latino and Indigenous arts in downtown Phoenix since the mid-seventies, and it shows in the best way. This nonprofit gallery and arts hub runs the full range: rotating exhibitions, artist talks, and classes that draw a crowd well beyond the First Friday tourists. Shows skew toward Latina and Indigenous voices, and the programming actually changes, so there's a reason to come back.

Arcade games and sticker vending machines frame the room at this slice joint in the Beacon Hill area, where the team behind Fremont's Lupo traded sourdough pies for New York-style foldable slices. The crust is the work of serious dough people, and the housemade ice cream could survive a white-tablecloth setting but seems happier alongside paper plates and plastic tumblers. Salads, too, punch above the room's decor.

Arcade games and sticker vending machines line the walls of this East Coast-style slice joint in Olde Burien, which is exactly the vibe the team behind Fremont's Lupo was going for. The crust is the work of dough obsessives, foldable and crisp in the New York tradition. Side salads and housemade ice cream are better than the paper plates and plastic tumblers would suggest, but nobody seems to mind.

Pork belly sisig arrives still sizzling on a cast-iron plate, which tells you most of what you need to know about the room. This Filipino restaurant near the Beacon Hill light rail grew out of a food truck the family started after redevelopment shuttered their first spot, and the new stationary digs feel more like a return than a debut. The menu runs to lumpia, bistec, and adobo, with flavors on the gentler, pull-you-in end of the spectrum.

An Italian cafe tucked inside a streetwear and sneaker shop, which is either a strange choice or the most Pioneer Square thing imaginable. Counter-service focaccia sandwiches and housemade pasta land in that comfortable zone between careful and fussy, and happy hour swings toward spritzes and antipasti without much ceremony. The kind of spot that handles a pre-game and a leisurely lunch date with equal ease.

The patio hangs so close to Lake Washington you could lose a chip in it. El Encanto is an upscale Mexican restaurant where the room is very white, the crowd is very photogenic, and the chef quietly runs circles around the decor. The chile en nogada, made daily with help from his mom, is the kind of detail that earns its reputation. The cocktail list takes the tequila selection seriously, which helps when the selfie-to-taco ratio tips the wrong way.

Charcoal grills and skewers of chicken thighs, beef tongue, and mochi wrapped in bacon define this Wallingford yakitori bar. Empty skewers go into containers shaped like Super Mario pipes, which tells you everything about the room's energy. Pressed sushi and small plates keep the highballs coming. On the way out, the Indigo Cow soft-serve window near the entrance turns milk from Hokkaido cows into a rich, swirly send-off.

The alleyway entrance in Madison Park sets the tone: this is an omakase counter that knows it doesn't need to try too hard. Yasutaka Suzuki, a former partner at the beloved Sushi Kashiba, adjusts rice temperatures fish by fish and rotates the menu with microseasons. He runs a precise, focused kitchen, but in front of diners he's warm and prone to laughing. The presidential-themed bathroom is its own subplot.

A tasting counter in Brooklyn where the kitchen uses yuzu as sauerkraut draped over clams instead of a tidy squeeze of acid. Chef Victoria Blamey's avant-garde tasting menu runs about three hours and tends to fill your head with strong flavors that most restaurants at this price point seem too nervous to attempt. The Dungeness crab empanada, built on a Chilean abalone dish with Chartreuse and fermented black beans, is the kind of thing that makes you question your senses.

The back deck hangs over the San Juan River, which does exactly what the name promises. This is a relaxed New American restaurant in Pagosa Springs, the kind of place where the chef traded white tablecloths for something more interesting: an eclectic menu that hops freely between ideas but lands on quality produce and sure hands. The New York Times put it on their 2024 Restaurant List, which is not nothing for a mountain-town spot this far off the usual circuit.

Tartan-print details and jade-green paneling set the tone at Kevin Gillespie's prix-fixe restaurant, where Scottish heritage and Southern cooking share a table without either one apologizing. The menu moves between things like mussels with spicy 'nduja and peach-lacquered duck, then lands on peanut butter chess pie as if to remind you where you are. It's a Michelin Selected pick that reads as personal project first and concept second.

The tortillas here come from heirloom corn nixtamalized in-house, and they're the point, not the packaging. Oro by Nixta is a Mexican restaurant that grew from a tortilleria, and the menu still thinks that way: braised meats, seasonal produce, and a deep roster of moles and salsas all orbit the corn. It landed on The New York Times Restaurant List in 2024, which tracks for a place this quietly serious about a grain most kitchens treat as an afterthought.

A French-American restaurant in downtown Lancaster that landed on the New York Times Restaurant List in 2024, Passerine treats the surrounding farmland as a pantry and smuggles in global technique without announcing it. The room is quiet enough that the food does most of the talking, which suits a kitchen this confident. Lancaster's Amish-country reputation does nothing to prepare you for what's actually on the plate.

A paper bowl at a picnic table outside a rural Virginia brewery is where this tasting trailer does its finest work. Sumac is exactly what it sounds like: a fire-cooked, hyper-local tasting menu served from a trailer parked in a field, with ingredients sourced within 150 miles. The menu shifts with whatever the land offers, and the New York Times put it on their 2024 Restaurant List, which seems about right for somewhere this quietly serious about a paper bowl.

The plate-lunch spot that landed on the New York Times Restaurant List sits on Perkins Road, dishing out smothered chicken and meatless vegetable sides that taste like somebody's grandmother meant every bite. The chef learned to cook in Mississippi and has been running this kitchen for decades, splitting the difference, geographically and spiritually, between New Orleans and Lafayette. Go hungry and plan to eat with a spoon.

Bill's is a counter-service sandwich shop in Lockeland Springs that took over a beloved bakery's space after a stretch as a pop-up, and the menu rotates, so you're ordering on faith. Expect big, sloppy sandwiches, from meatloaf under a coat of sauce to roasted pork on focaccia, plus fried duros sold as Cheddy Ranch Puffs. Nashville Scene named it Best Sandwich Shop in 2024, so bring napkins and no plans for the afternoon.

A black-and-white dining room tucked into the Scottsdale Waterfront strip mall, where the guacamole arrives studded with pomegranate seeds and warm steak cubes, which sounds like a gimmick until it doesn't. This modern Mexican restaurant runs from quesabirria tacos to charred octopus, and the cocktails come dressed with flower petals and charred cinnamon sticks, because subtlety is apparently optional. The flan, cracked with caramel shards, lands the ending.

Churros come in loops, bites, or sticks here, all fried to order, so you wait a minute and they arrive properly hot. Dulce is a dessert café in a Gilbert strip mall where the menu is essentially a build-your-own operation: pick a shape, choose a dip or glaze, add toppings if you like. The plain cinnamon sugar version makes the strongest case that the rest of the menu is just fun extras.