It’s one of the oldest restaurants in Los Angeles, one of two debated originators of the French Dip and the birthplace of a cornerstones of the city’s contemporary cocktail scene. But come next month, Cole’s will permanently close its doors.
The Downtown L.A. restaurant, a 6th Street mainstay since 1908 that’s easily spotted by its neon sign, will cease operations on August 3, 2025.
The news surfaced over the weekend—first spotted by DTLA Weekly—and since then, Eater spoke with owner Cedd Moses, who confirmed the plans and cited the lingering impacts of the pandemic, the dual writers and actors strikes, rising costs and local bureaucracy. “We have cherished our time serving the Downtown community, and will continue to craft great drinks and our renowned French dip sandwiches until we shutter,” Moses said in a statement shared with the publication.
If you ever sat in one of Cole’s shiny red booths over a late-night plate of garlic fries and an old-fashioned, then you already probably have some sense of the history here, from its famed French dip to its frequent appearances in film and TV (perhaps most beautifully shot on Mad Men) to its purported regulars: Plaques in the men’s room boast that gangster Mickey Cohen and novelist Charles Bukowski “pissed here” (as seen in my photo below from a 2014 visit—so excuse the decade-old smartphone quality).
Cole’s started service in 1908 as a sandwich shop and bar on the ground floor of the Pacific Electric Building, then a terminal on L.A.’s extensive streetcar system. Though the Red Car eventually went away, Cole’s persisted, and as it entered its second century in service, it found a new place in L.A.’s culinary scene. Moses’s ownership group Pouring With Heart (then 213 Hospitality) scooped up the venue in the aughts and unveiled its renovation in 2008; a year later, the Varnish began serving some of the city’s finest cocktails in the backroom, an early entry among L.A.’s contemporary crop of speakeasy-style bars (it shuttered last year).
But its biggest claim to fame just might be as the inventor of the French dip—supposedly. As the story goes, back in 1908 chef Jack Garlinghouse dipped a hand-carved sandwich into the meat’s juices to soften up the French bread, and thus the French dip was born. But Chinatown’s Philippe the Original, which opened in 1908 as well, also lays claim to the French dip, when a decade later one was accidentally dropped into a roasting pan. So which is the actual originator? Because there’s no hard evidence in either’s camp, we’ll likely never know.
As for the future of the Cole’s space, since it’s a designated Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument, any major modifications or threats of demolition will need to be approved by a city commission.