A Guide to Fishtown, Philadelphia’s Coolest Neighborhood

It’s no secret among Philadelphia locals that Fishtown is one of the city’s buzziest neighborhoods these days. What started as a small fishing village in the 1700s — hence the name — became a working-class hub of the commercial shad-fishing industry over the next two centuries.

But the neighborhood, which is about 20 minutes north of Center City by train, fell on hard times by the 1990s and early 2000s. About 10 years ago, however, things began to change with the opening of a popular beer hall, a few yoga studios and even the flagship location of La Colombe, a high-end Philadelphia-based coffee brand.

Since then, Fishtown has drawn locals to North Philly with its thriving live music scene including venues like The Fillmore and Johnny Brenda’s, award-winning restaurants like Thai spot Kalaya (whose chef, Chutatip “Nok” Suntaranon, won a James Beard Award in 2023) and innovative culinary entrepreneurs: Philly’s first cheese vending machine and urban winery both opened in Fishtown in 2024.

Even Beyoncé thinks Fishtown is cool: She’s ordered her birthday cake from Cake Life Bake Shop several times over the years.

The August 2024 opening of the chic 50-room Hotel Anna & Bel in the former Penn Asylum for Indigent Widows and Single Women cemented the neighborhood as a destination in its own right. With an in-house Mediterranean restaurant and a vibrant cocktail bar, this new boutique hotel welcomes locals in but also provides a serene haven for guests with a heated outdoor pool in its center courtyard.

I recently spent a weekend in Fishtown: Here are the best places to eat and drink and things to do in 48 hours in this up-and-coming Philadelphia neighborhood. (Plus, how to get there on points!)

How to get to Fishtown, Philadelphia

Since I live in New York City and don’t own a car, the easiest way for me to get to Fishtown was via Amtrak train. It took about 1 1/2 hours to get from New York’s Moynihan Train Hall at Penn Station to Philadelphia’s William H. Gray III 30th Street Station on the Northeast Regional train. (Faster Acela trains make the trip in a little over an hour.)

With dozens of departures a day, it’s easy to snag last-minute tickets, but you’ll save money by booking in advance. I paid about $200 for round-trip coach class fares a couple of days before my trip. However fares start from $10 or 375 Amtrak Guest Rewards points each way if you book a month or so out. It’s also possible to get business-class tickets on an Acela train starting around $58 or 2,175 Amtrak Guest Rewards points each way if you plan ahead.

I don’t travel on Amtrak frequently enough to warrant getting an Amtrak credit card, but if you do, the Amtrak Guest Rewards® Mastercard® offers 2 points per dollar spent on Amtrak travel, including onboard purchases, and the Amtrak Guest Rewards® Preferred Mastercard® offers 3 points per dollar spent on Amtrak travel. Both cards offer perks like a 5% rebate when redeeming Amtrak Guest Rewards points for travel and rebates as a statement credit on onboard food and beverage purchases.

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The information for the Amtrak Guest Rewards Mastercard and the Amtrak Guest Rewards Preferred Mastercard has been collected independently by The Points Guy. The card details on this page have not been reviewed or provided by the card issuer.

Related: The best credit cards for Amtrak and train travel

From the 30th Street Station it is an easy transfer to Philly’s SEPTA metro system for the 20-minute ride to Fishtown. Uber and Lyft both operate in Philadelphia and take about 15 minutes, depending on traffic.

If you’re coming from farther away, Philadelphia International Airport (PHL) is just a 20-minute drive south of Fishtown and is the primary hub for American Airlines in the Northeast.

For those making it a road trip, it’s fairly simple to find street parking in Fishtown, since it’s a residential neighborhood.

While there are plenty of points hotels in Center City, like the W Philadelphia and the Motto by Hilton Philadelphia Rittenhouse Square, I skipped the redemption opportunities to stay at the new boutique Hotel Anna & Bel to immerse myself in this charming neighborhood for the weekend instead.

Just remember to maximize your points earnings by using a travel credit card like the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card to earn 5 points per dollar on hotel bookings purchased through Chase Travel℠.

Hotel Anna & Bel

Named after its location on the corner of East Susquehanna Avenue and Belgrade Street, Hotel Anna & Bel is a comfortable and chic place to stay. The independent boutique hotel, which just opened in August 2024, is operated by Foyer Project, a locally based hospitality and real estate development firm.

Each of the 50 rooms and suites has a unique layout that preserves the 18th-century red brick building’s original features and historic character. They are decorated with custom-made furniture from Bali and unique pieces of art from mostly local female artists. Some have shared balconies that look out over the hotel’s heated pool in its central courtyard. Rooms also come with kitchenettes — the owners are a married couple and parents to three boys, so they wanted to provide families with facilities to keep snacks and lend the hotel a residential feel.

The vibe during my stay was generally relaxed, with groups of girlfriends lounging by the pool to reconnect for a few days or couples sneaking away for a quiet weekend. Locals and guests alike mingled at Bastia, the hotel’s restaurant serving a mix of Corsican and Sardinian fare, and Caletta, its intimate cocktail bar and piano lounge.

Room rates at Hotel Anna & Bel start at $217 per night.

There are dozens of bars and restaurants to choose from in Fishtown, so you could easily spend an entire week eating and drinking your way through the neighborhood. But, if you just have 48 hours like I did, these are the highlights. An added bonus? I was able to earn 4 points per dollar on dining at restaurants (on up to $50,000 in purchases per calendar year, then 1 point per dollar thereafter) at all these places using my American Express® Gold Card.

Kalaya

Following her James Beard Award win in 2023, Kalaya’s chef Chutatip “Nok” Suntaranon was recently featured in the seventh season of Netflix’s “Chef’s Table.”

Her southern Thai specialties are served in a large warehouselike space on West Palmer Street. My friends and I opted for the $75-per-person “Taste of Phuket” prix-fixe menu that featured 13 dishes including standouts like the bright purple shaw muang flower-shaped dumplings, hearty poh taek seafood soup and two flavors of shaved ice (coconut pineapple and coffee caramel). I left so full I could barely walk, but it was a happy kind of discomfort.

Middle Child Clubhouse

Middle Child Clubhouse, located under the elevated train on North Front Street, is open for breakfast, lunch and dinner every day of the week except Monday. When we arrived around 8 p.m. on a Friday night, the dining room was buzzy and packed to the brim.

Of all the creative remixes of classic comfort foods, my favorite dishes included the latkes served “okonomiyaki-style” with unagi, kewpie, pickled ginger and scallion ($3 per piece) and the pepperoni ragu rigatoni served with blush sauce, Sicilian oregano and parmesan ($22). I also enjoyed the “Philly Chilly,” a rotating seasonal frozen drink — when I was there in late September they were serving a pumpkin spice painkiller ($14), which was a festive blend of spiced rum, pineapple, coconut and orange juice.

Fiore

For breakfast or lunch, take a short walk from Hotel Anna & Bel to Fiore, a traditional Italian bakery just over the Fishtown border in East Kensington on Frankford Avenue. We ordered a bunch of things and split them, including the saltie sandwich with soft scrambled eggs and whipped ricotta on house-made focaccia ($11), a maritozzi bun filled with fresh whipped cream ($5), a pistachio cornetti ($6), a savory tomato pastry ($5) and a pile of hash browns ($7).

Perrystead Dairy Cheese Vending Machine

Perrystead Dairy is technically located just a few blocks west of Fishtown proper in the Olde Kensington neighborhood, but this award-winning cheesemaker is worth walking the extra few blocks to stock up on picnic supplies or even souvenirs to bring home. The shop itself is closed on Saturdays and Sundays, but don’t worry — buying cheese from its 24/7 cheese vending machine out front is half the fun.

I chose Perrystead’s signature Intergalactic cheese ($17), a slightly stinky soft cow’s milk cheese made with Iberian cardoon thistle flowers instead of animal rennet. They also sell crackers, jams and cured meats in the vending machine if you are planning a picnic.

Cake Life Bake Shop

Cake Life Bake Shop is best known for making Beyoncé’s birthday cake multiple times, but I was just looking for a little sweet treat on the Saturday afternoon that I stopped into this neighborhood bakery on Frankford Avenue.

Most of the cupcake flavors are seasonal, so the strawberry shake cupcake ($5) I had may not be available when you stop by, but you’ll always find classics like Funfetti and red velvet on the menu.

Mural City Cellars

Mural City Cellars, the first urban winery in Philadelphia, moved to its new digs on the northern end of Fishtown in March 2024. The former auto body shop is now home to a wine-making facility, bottle shop and wine bar. Mural City Cellars is known for making just a handful of wines each year from grapes sourced from growers within a 300-mile radius of Philadelphia.

My friends and I loved Mural City Cellars’ relaxed and unpretentious vibe so much we stopped by twice in one weekend — once on Friday night to enjoy a bottle of skin-contact pinot gris ($55) in the wine garden across the street where a live band played, and again on Saturday afternoon for glasses of chambourcin ($14), a jammy chilled red, at the bar indoors to break up our walk back to the hotel from lunch.

There are several vintage and antique stores located along Frankford Avenue, the main commercial corridor of Fishtown, but I loved the eclectic blend of furniture, homewares, jewelry and miscellaneous tchotchkes I found at Jinxed Vintage. Opened about 10 years ago in this location, Jinxed also has two other area stores in South Philly and in Manayunk.

Penn Treaty Park

The far eastern boundary of Fishtown is the Delaware River, which is best viewed from Penn Treaty Park, a small urban park with views of the Benjamin Franklin Bridge. The park gets its name from being the place where, according to legend, William Penn signed a peace treaty with the Lenape tribe in the 17th century.

You can take your picnic supplies here on a warm afternoon for lunch or explore it on a coffee walk like I did while my friends slept in on Sunday morning before we departed.

Johnny Brenda’s

Though I didn’t get a chance to catch a live show at Johnny Brenda’s, this local music venue on the corner of Frankford Avenue and East Girard Avenue has been a neighborhood stalwart since opening in 2003. Downstairs, you’ll find a gastropub serving smashburgers and local beer. Upstairs, you can find indie rock artists and bands like Kurt Vile and Matt Pond PA playing in the upcoming months.