Welcome to NYLON City Guides, your one stop shop for the perfect vacation. Here you’ll find the ultimate recommendations for places to stay, eat, drink, shop and more for the world’s hottest cities – all tested and approved by NYLON editors. Read on for your ideal NYLON approved itinerary.
Perhaps this is the inevitable result of the culture’s obsession with Western aesthetics in recent years, but Nashville appears to be at the top of the world’s travel route right now. To be fair, historic Tennessee has never really left the cultural conversation. But there seems to be a subtle renaissance in its music-gilded avenues – the city skyline dotted with new construction on my last visit there and a talking point with almost everyone I’ve seen. encountered. “We are currently the crane capital of the world,” my hotel manager joked on day one.
While it may be, the bones of Nashville are still deep. Despite the recent facelift, there is still a sense of humble routine in the town’s business activities: locals hang out with their favorites, honky tonks play old classics, and like in a small town, everyone knows everyone else – it suffices. talk to the group of local musicians in the smoking section outside each bar.
In that same sense of blending old and new, The NYLON Nashville Guidebook is our ideal balance between tradition and updating classics. Read on to prepare for your next trip to Nashville to stay, eat, drink and more.
Where to stay
Nashville: There’s nothing quite like staying in the heart of downtown Nashville, and the glamorous branch of the W Hotel is the perfect place for those trying to take advantage of all the city has to offer. They call it Music City, and with the W Nashville’s prime location in the thriving Gulch neighborhood, you’re literally in the mix. A short drive from the hotel is the city’s illustrious (albeit a bit boring) Music Row; a few minutes in the other direction and you’re on Broadway, Nashville’s Main Street, and functionally a dual-line avenue of bars and live music. Everywhere you go there is a reminder of what this city is known for, and that way there is a bit of electrical energy in the air.
The musical motif extends inside the hotel which is fully decorated and will lovingly serve as a refuge after staying at the locals’ favorite honky tonk bar until 3 a.m. The rooms are spacious and modern in southern style, but not too high. The hotel’s L-shaped swimming pool, generous green space terrace and nearly 360-degree rooftop bar are all perfect for relaxing. When you’re ready to start over, you’re never out of sight of a bar. (There are over eight of them throughout the hotel.) Then, when you’re ready to be revitalized the next morning, there’s The Dutch, where the hotel’s breakfast and coffee shop with tomato poached eggs and a breakfast spread are a great choice.
Where to eat
Arnold’s country kitchen: Not every trip to the South is truly complete without at least one hearty, decadent, comfort meal not good for the body but good for the soul. Arnold’s Country Kitchen, or just Arnold’s, will do. The certified institution has been in business in Nashville since 1982 and serves all of its comfort classics – fried catfish, roast beef, brisket, roast chicken and more, according to its daily menu – in the cafeteria. We recommend the roast beef, which is sliced to order, the tender breast, the gooey pie and, duh, the mac and cheese. The best part? All of this will make you back down, maybe, $ 12.
Henriette Red: Tennessee may be a landlocked state, but Nashville’s seafood scene is still, surprisingly, vibrant. Henrietta Red, a bright white-walled restaurant in Germantown, was named Best New Restaurant by enjoy your food and GQ in 2017. The place has a seasonal vegetable-based menu, but the real star of the show is its raw bar, which offers 10 different varieties of coastal oysters all over the place. After you’ve had your fill of it, you can’t go wrong with a seafood dish, as well as the lamb sausage and gnocchi.
Carne Mare: Big spenders and meat lovers alike, turn your gaze to the sparkling new spot of Carne Mare, celebrity chef Andrew Carmellini’s upscale Italian chophouse, named ‘meat sea’ and (for you) ideally attached to the W. You don’t don’t need I have to tell you that all meat is decadent, sinful, rich, amazing, etc. Instead, I’ll highlight two non-meat items: the beetroot steak, a feat of chef’s ingenuity that makes this vegetarian meat option smoky, a treat for the taste buds, and the 17-layer chocolate cake, because , well, the reason is its name.
Where to drink
The Blue Room / Third Man Records: There’s no shortage of famous bars, dives, and liquor outlets all along Nashville’s Main Street, Broadway, but for a truly unique drinking experience, you’ll want to visit an unlikely location (or maybe likely spot for Nashville): a recording studio. Jack White’s famous Third Man Records opened their Blue Room Bar in July 2021, and it truly is a meaningful experience.
Entirely bathed in electric blue light with a real taxidermy elephant head hanging on its walls, the bar gives the impression of entering a surreal and chic club of the outside world. Equipped with a stage, this is the same room where hundreds of artists have recorded and posed for the label’s famous 7 inch vinyl series, Blue series. While the signature cocktails on the menu are a bit dated, we recommend The Champ – restado tequila, crème de cassis, lemon, ginger ale, orange and bitters – to get you started.
What to do
Save money Upscale Hillbilly: Something strange happens to the brain the second lands in Nashville. A deep, sudden and inexplicable desire to wear cowboy boots, hats and fringes overwhelms the body. (Maybe it’s because real people Actually wear these everyday items here.) If it happens to you, put aside the Stetson and shoe stores and launch High Class Hillbilly, a quaint two-level thrift shop that stocks all of the above and more trinkets. organized to help you complete your look. There are also normal clothing and genuine vintage pieces taken from the closets of local notables and collectors. Also, the week I was there, it was rumored that Kate Moss paid a visit and picked up a few pieces. If it’s good enough for her, it’s good enough for me.
Visit the African-American Music MuseumAs well as being a solid, educational, and history-correcting resource for tracing the musical lineage of the African American Diaspora, the Museum of African American Music is also great fun. It opened in January 2021 and offers a ton of interactive features that complement its text-rich walls, like stations that let you produce your own beat, compose a song, and rap with the greats. Find out how each musical genre really finds its roots in the Black Diaspora and, if anything, this will give you a place to work around a meal of Prince’s Spicy Chicken of the Assembly Food Hall next door.
Have Honky Tonk Tuesday at American Legion: The American Legion Post 82 is technically a hub for American veterans, but on Tuesdays it transforms into a loud, festive social place with a dance floor and live music from local country and hillbilly bands. This is, we’ll say, real country – but the music, quite possibly performed by Nashville’s most well-known honky tonk band. cowboys, is the best of its kind, the beers are cheap and everyone is more than nice to teach you how to take two steps on the fly when you’re finally done watching on the sidelines and ready to jump into the mix.
