Time Bar/The Terrace

Review

Formerly the spare wing of the iconic Fairmont Peace Hotel across the road, the building at 23 Nanjing Road opened in November 2011 as the Swatch Art Peace Hotel, a high-concept boutique hotel that is home to galleries and artists in residence as well as the usual luxury good stores.

Time Bar and the Terrace sit on the sixth and seventh floor of the impressive building, though Time, a small space full of dark woods and black stone, feels more of an adjunct to the adjacent Malaysian restaurant Shook.

The impressive selection of vintage bottles in the wall, and the presence of a Truffle Martini including shaved truffle on the menu, indicate that Time is firmly targeting Shanghai's more spendy clientele. (They auctioned an 1855 Croizet plus dinner cooked by the restaurant's executive chef for a million renmimbi - £100k.)

Time's proficient bar staff make very good drinks, once you get past the typically Shanghai gender categorisation of drinks on the menu, but the star of the show here is really the Terrace.

Even in winter, the rooftop space, with views through colonial towers across the river into Pudong and over the lights of The Bund, impresses. Once the weather warms up it will provide some of Shanghai's best alfresco drinking.