Free Shots and Farewells for Hutong Favorite Fang, Sep 17
Bad news, Beijing: yet another Beijing nightlife favorite is being forced to shut its doors. After a relatively quiet period, this shuttering stings even more as the victim – Fang Bar – has been here before, having already been forced to shut their original Fangjia location last summer.
The popular cocktail bar announced its closure via a WeChat post last night (Thursday, Sep 13). No reason was given for the closure in the post, but co-owner Zak Elmasri later told the Beijinger that the building that houses Fang "will be demolished as part of a total 1800sqm of illegal structure that will be demolished from the Xinhua Wenhua mansions. The management company has been bullied out by pressure from the local authorities." He added that everything above the first floor will be leaving the building so that the higher floors can be converted into apartments.
In the closure announcement, the Fang team went on to promise “a heavy flow of free cocktail shots” throughout the weekend before their closure on Monday, while also describing the team’s “heavy heart” about the situation before going on to thank patrons.
Fang's interior
Founded by Beijing nightlife vet Xiao Shuai – pictured in the lead image above and credited by many industry insiders as being a pioneering guide to imported craft brews for Chinese patrons via his bottle bar El Nido on Fangjia Hutong – and British expat and hutong devotee Elmasri in October 2015, the original Fang was an instant hit for alleyway crowds craving creative cocktails. Aside from offering those in the neighborhood a rare alternative to beer, the bar also gained a solid reputation for its creative use of Chinese ingredients before such combinations were as common as they are now.
The bar’s second phase further south in Shoubi Hutong has a less cozy, more sleek vibe aided by the fact that it couples a long narrow room with an equally lengthy bar, soft lighting, and quite frequently nary an empty seat in sight on account of it being one of the few hutong bars not to be obliterated by the Great Brickening.
The exterior of the Jiaodaokou Fang
While this second closure will surely discourage Fang fans, the team’s announcement ends on a bright note, declaring: “not one to bow in the face of adversity, we vow to continue fighting on. As of next week, we will be moving back in with our older brother El Nido in the Other Place courtyard space” in reference to their sister beer bar’s second iteration on Beiluogu Xiang, which got up and running earlier this summer.
Not one to bow in the face of adversity, we vow to continue fighting on. As of next week, we will be moving back in with our older brother El Nido in the Other Place courtyard space.
What's more: Elmasri said that the closure might only be a setback, rather than Fang's definitive end, explaining: "To be in this game and to do what we are doing, you have to be ready for the worst case scenario. Now we are just planning for the next location, looking for alternative backup options and trying to make sure we maintain everything that we have going."
The original Fang at Fangjia Hutong before it was bricked up
That means hutong barflies have little choice but to take the bad news with a stiff upper lip, knock back a few strong ones one last time at Fang, and enjoy the Other Place and Xiao Shuai and Elmasri’s laudable efforts to keep the party going in an ever-shrinking, but always vibrant, alleyway nightlife scene.
To read the closure announcement in full, go here.
What in the world is this "Great Brickening"? Catch up here
Throughout much of 2017, Beijing authorities began swiftly and relentlessly cracking down on street level bars and restaurants that had long operated in zoning gray areas. Though scant enforcement of zoning rules had been the norm for years, the city seemed set on a beautification campaign that some saw as an overdue cleanup, though others despaired as their favorite bars and restaurants were bricked up and forced to shut down. Xiao Shuai and many of his fellow veteran business owners on Fangjia Hutong became faces of what was colloquially coined The Great Brickening, as throngs of patrons griped about what they saw as an overreach that robbed Beijing of its character, all to no avail as bars like El Nido and other Fangjia haunts were walled up by autumn.
Xiaoshuai and Rain, owner of the neighboring Cellar Door bar, in Fangjia after their businesses were bricked up
For one of the cover stories in the November 2017 issue of the Beijinger which was dedicated to The Great Brickening’s aftermath, Xiao Shuai put it simply: “The hutongs are colder and colder. There’s hardly anything here in Fangjia anymore, except for the public toilets! Many interesting businesses are gone.”
The hutongs are colder and colder. There's hardly anything here in Fangjia anymore, except for the public toilets! Many interesting businesses are gone.
However, at the time he struck an optimistic tone that foreshadows he and his Fang cohorts’ current determination to carry on at The Other Place, saying: “It’s a process. I can’t recover what we had, but maybe we can keep going and maybe eventually it will be better. After all, I’m still living in the hutongs, and am determined to stay.”
Photos courtesy of Fang, Uni You
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