L.A. Jackson

The rooftop bar and restaurant on top of the Thompson hotel in the Gulch. Weekends run loud: dance music, a packed floor, a tree growing on the roof, and cocktails with edible garnishes.

The tower beneath it is the Thompson, a 12-story boutique hotel with 224 rooms that opened in October 2016.

The Gulch was a rail yard with roots older than the Civil War, then sat mostly undeveloped for decades after World War II. The early-2000s rebuild made it the South’s first LEED-certified neighborhood.

The bar opened with the hotel, launched by New Orleans chef John Besh and Our House Hospitality, with 200 seats and a Southern lean to the beer list and kitchen.

It has been voted Nashville Scene’s best rooftop bar 6 years running. The staples: espresso martinis, glitter chicken, and a double-patty smashburger.

Downstairs at street level: Marsh House, the hotel’s Southern seafood restaurant, and Killebrew, a coffee shop named for J.B. Killebrew, Tennessee’s first commissioner of agriculture.