Tel Aviv's most theatrical bar hides inside the Hotel B Berdichevsky, and it treats every drink as a small performance. Cocktails arrive in extravagant vessels, a red clenched fist, a miniature bathtub overflowing with bubbles, and the room hums with 1920s speakeasy mischief. Behind the showmanship sits real craft.
We rank Bellboy No. 9 on our list of the 25 best hidden gem bars in the world. It is the Middle East's entry near the top of the list, and it earns its place by doing something very few bars manage: balancing genuine spectacle with genuine substance, in a room you have to know to find.
Inside the Hotel B Berdichevsky
Bellboy occupies a space within the Hotel B Berdichevsky, on Berdichevsky Street in the Lev HaIr quarter of central Tel Aviv. From the street it gives little away; the reward for finding it is a jewel-box room dressed in the style of a 1920s hotel bar, all velvet, leather, marble and brass under low, flattering light. The hotel setting is not incidental. The whole concept riffs on the golden-age grand hotel, with the bar staff cast as the bellboys of the name, attentive, theatrical, and in on the joke.
That framing gives Bellboy a distinct identity in a city full of good bars. It is playful without being juvenile, glamorous without being stiff, and it wears its concept lightly enough that the drinks always come first. The room is intimate, which keeps the theatre personal rather than staged, and reservations are effectively essential, so a seat here feels earned.
Ariel Leizgold, Israel's cocktail pioneer
Bellboy is the creation of Ariel Leizgold, one of the pioneers of Israel's modern cocktail movement and among the most decorated bartenders the country has produced. He was the Israeli country winner of Diageo's World Class competition in 2015, and he has spent years pushing Tel Aviv's bar culture forward. Bellboy, which opened in 2014, is his most famous room and the clearest statement of his sensibility: rigorous cocktail technique wrapped in showmanship and hospitality.
That pedigree matters for a bar built on spectacle, because the risk of theatre is that it hides thin drinks. Leizgold's involvement guarantees the opposite. The flourishes at Bellboy sit on top of a serious foundation, and the bar has become the place visiting cocktail enthusiasts seek out precisely because the substance justifies the show. It is a training ground and a talking point for the wider Tel Aviv scene, much as the best bars elsewhere on this list are for their cities.
A hotel-themed theatre
What people remember about Bellboy is the presentation. Drinks arrive in vessels that turn each order into an event: a cocktail served in a red clenched fist, another in a small bathtub frothing with bubbles, and a rotating cast of props that changes the mood of the room from one table to the next. Reports of the bar's theatrics have included a vintage baby carriage wheeled through the room to dispense shots in oyster shells, the kind of flourish that has made Bellboy a fixture of Tel Aviv nightlife lore.
The point of all this is not novelty for its own sake but delight. Bellboy understands that a cocktail is an experience as much as a drink, and it leans into that with a confidence few bars can carry off. The trick, and the reason it works, is that the spectacle never comes at the expense of the liquid in the glass. You leave remembering both the show and the drink, which is a harder balance to strike than it looks.
The drinks
Beneath the theatre, the cocktails are inventive and well built. Two signatures show the range. Rings a Bell is a complex, layered drink of gin, sauvignon blanc and Campari with lychee cordial, grapefruit, cocoa balsamic, passion fruit and Sichuan chocolate, a lot of moving parts held in balance. Josephine's Pet is the savoury counterpoint: blue-cheese-infused cognac with the bar's own citrus honey, Mandarine Napoléon and lime, the sort of drink that sounds daring and tastes considered.
The list rewards both the adventurous and the classicist, and the bar team speak the language of modern cocktails fluently. Prices sit around the $$$ mark for the city, and the bar runs an early happy hour, so an earlier arrival can be both easier to book and better value. As at the other guided bars on this list, telling the bartender what you like and letting them choose is a reliable route to the best of the menu.
Butler, the bar within the bar
Bellboy has a secret of its own. Hidden behind a door within is Butler, a semi-secret room of around a dozen bar stools, run by a single bartender and devoted to classic and half-forgotten cocktails alongside oysters. Where Bellboy is theatrical, Butler is intimate and studious, drawing on the traditions of figures like Jerry Thomas and Harry Craddock. It can be booked privately for a small group, and it functions as a quieter, more serious companion to the show next door.
That a hidden bar contains an even more hidden bar is exactly the kind of layered concealment this list prizes. Together, Bellboy and Butler give you two distinct experiences behind one unmarked entrance: spectacle and study, side by side. For a visitor with an evening to spend, working from one to the other is one of the most rewarding things you can do in Tel Aviv after dark.
Tel Aviv, a cocktail city
Bellboy did not appear in isolation. Over the past fifteen years Tel Aviv has become one of the most exciting drinking cities in the world, a place where a young, design-literate and endlessly social population has driven a boom in ambitious bars, and Ariel Leizgold has been at the centre of that story from the start. He was among the bartenders who helped open the city's first dedicated cocktail bars, and he has spent his career raising the standard and training the talent that now staffs rooms across Tel Aviv.
Bellboy is his flagship and, in many ways, the city's calling card: the bar that visiting drinkers put at the top of their list and that locals bring out-of-towners to show off. To understand why Tel Aviv punches so far above its weight in the global cocktail conversation, an evening here is the best possible introduction. It is both a great bar in its own right and a window onto a whole scene.
The art of the vessel
The extravagant vessels are Bellboy's signature, and they are worth dwelling on because they capture the bar's whole philosophy. Serving a cocktail in a clenched red fist or a bubble-filled bathtub is, on one level, pure spectacle, the kind of thing that gives a table something to talk about. But the vessels are also a form of hospitality, a way of making each order feel like a gift rather than a transaction. Bellboy treats the moment a drink arrives as a small piece of theatre staged just for you.
The risk of this approach is obvious: gimmickry can hollow out a bar. Bellboy avoids the trap because the liquid inside the fist or the bathtub is as considered as the presentation, so the show enhances the drink rather than distracting from it. It is a difficult balance, and the fact that Bellboy has held it for more than a decade is a testament to the seriousness underneath the fun. Plenty of bars have tried theatrical service and tipped into kitsch; this is one of the few that has made it last.
The room itself
The setting deserves its own mention. Bellboy occupies a jewel-box space dressed in the manner of a 1920s luxury hotel bar: velvet, leather, marble and brass, lit low and warm so that everything glows a little. It is intimate without feeling cramped, and glamorous without feeling stiff, the kind of room that makes you sit up a little straighter and settle in for the evening. The hotel-bar conceit runs through every detail, from the staff's bellboy framing to the fittings, and it gives the theatrics a coherent stage to play out on. You could strip away every prop and the room would still be one of the loveliest places to drink in Tel Aviv.
A night at Bellboy, and at Butler
An evening here has a particular arc. You find the door, you are admitted, and you settle into that grand-hotel room where the staff play their roles with a wink. Order from the menu and the theatre begins; order the bar's way and you may be led somewhere unexpected. For those who want to go deeper, the move is to ask about Butler, the concealed sister bar behind a door within, where a single bartender pours classic and forgotten cocktails to a dozen guests over oysters.
Working from the spectacle of Bellboy to the studious quiet of Butler is one of the great drinking experiences in the region, two distinct moods behind a single hidden entrance. It is also a neat encapsulation of what makes Bellboy special: it can be as loud or as intimate as you want, as playful or as serious, and it is confident enough to offer both. Few bars anywhere give you that range, and fewer still make finding it feel like such a reward.
Why we rank it No. 9
Bellboy sits at No. 9 because it does the hard thing so well: it is genuinely fun without being shallow. It is hidden inside a hotel, it is theatrical in a way that has made it internationally known, and it is backed by one of the region's most accomplished bartenders and a concealed sister bar for the purists. Featured on 50 Best's Discovery guide, it is one of the defining cocktail destinations of the Middle East, and the clearest proof on this list that a serious drink and a genuine sense of theatre can share the same room. For more of the city, see our Tel Aviv bar guide.
How to visit
Bellboy is inside the Hotel B Berdichevsky on Berdichevsky Street in Lev HaIr, and reservations are strongly advised, since walk-ins are often turned away when the small room is full. The bar opens in the evening and runs late, with an early happy hour that is worth catching for both the easier table and the better value. Dress for the occasion, come ready to be entertained, and ask about slipping into Butler if you want the quieter, classics-focused side of the operation. This is a bar to enjoy at the pace of the show, so give it the whole evening.
What to order
- 01
Rings a Bell
A layered signature: gin, sauvignon blanc, Campari, lychee, grapefruit, cocoa balsamic, passion fruit and Sichuan chocolate.
- 02
Josephine's Pet
Blue-cheese-infused cognac, Bellboy citrus honey, Mandarine Napoléon and lime.
- 03
Whatever comes in a bathtub
Order for the theatre at least once; the vessels are half the fun.
- 04
A classic at Butler
If you can get into the hidden sister bar, order a well-made classic and some oysters.