The Back Room on Norfolk Street in the Lower East Side is one of only two bars in New York that operated as an actual illegal speakeasy during Prohibition and is still open. The original space was known as the back of Ratner's, a famous deli on Delancey Street, and it was a meeting place for figures like Bugsy Siegel, Lucky Luciano, and Meyer Lansky. The room's location at the junction of three buildings meant it had exits onto Suffolk, Norfolk, and Delancey streets, which was useful when the police came around.

Today the entrance is through the Lower East Side Toy Company, a fake storefront that nods to the deceptive frontages that speakeasies used to avoid detection. Inside there are velvet armchairs, ornate chandeliers, baroque paintings on the walls, stamped-tin ceilings, and a brick fireplace. The cocktails are served in teacups on saucers, the same way drinks were concealed during Prohibition so they'd look like tea if a raid came through.

The room is low-lit, genuinely beautiful, and has a weight to it that most bars don't. The history isn't decorative here. It's in the walls.