Openings

Playland, a New Funhouse-Themed Bar, Opens in the Old Kimo’s Space

Playland
Playland Photo: Michael David Rose/Urban Daddy

The storied space that was once Kimo’s (1351 Polk at Pine), which began life as a gay bar in 1978 only to morph into more of a rock venue in the eighties and nineties, has a new, very different tenant called Playland. As Urban Daddy shows us today, the bar has been renovated, the upstairs windows uncovered, and some hardwood (or faux hardwood) floors have gone in to the once dark and divey space. Yes, it’s a makeover that is sure to please some folks in the Russian Hill and Lower Nob Hill environs who are looking for a new place to enjoy a decent drink, but it’s also sure to sadden everyone who ever loved Kimo’s, and who feared that its replacement might look like this.

In any event, Playland takes its name from the long-gone amusement park that used to sit beside Ocean Beach, and though we don’t see any Skee-ball or Whack-a-Mole, there are marquee lights overhead, some various eclectic trinkets decorating the bar, and a smoke-breathing bull’s head imported from Guadalajara.

They opened for business last Friday, and as of this Friday they’ll be launching their cocktail menu featuring odes to amusement parks, like a cotton-candy Cosmopolitan.

A New Funhouse Bar on Polk [Urban Daddy]
Earlier: Kimo’s to Close After 34 Years on Polk Street

Playland, a New Funhouse-Themed Bar, Opens in the Old Kimo’s Space