Step through the plate-glass door and you’ll find yourself in another beer garden, this one being much larger than the sidewalk café and which has more of a sports bar feel. This area is packed during the Wells Street Art Fair held every June and challenges the staff to prevent patrons from illegally handing beers to those on the street. Upon arrival, you’ll locate the Fireside Inn’s main entrance through the sidewalk café filled with metal high-backed chairs and cocktail tables. However you get there, the Fireplace Inn can easily be spotted with its flaming logo set upon a large, hanging black sign that matches the awning. Chicago Bar Project recommendation: grab a cab or take the Brown Line to Sedgwick and hoof it a few blocks over. The current owner, of the Novak family, even lives upstairs at this unique brick two-flat – how old-school is that? If you’re sado-masochistic and drive to the Fireplace Inn, you’ll find valet parking for $10 out front as you’ve got a snowball’s chance of finding street parking even with the meters along Wells. The building dates back to 1873, having been erected just after the Great Conflagration of 1871, and was listed as belonging to a plumber, insurance broker, bookkeeper, and then the short-lived Rigoletto Opera Café in 1965. The structure now housing the Fireplace Inn was originally opened in 1966 at “John Cale’s Fireplace Inn,” with Richard Novak having opened the present version in 1969.

Not to be confused with the Fireside Inn (Ravenswood) or Fireside Bowl (Logan Square), the Fireplace Inn is located in the heart of Old Town, on Wells Street next to the Suite Lounge and across from Burton Place and Bistro Margot. Add to that its long history and you’ll quickly realize why the Fireplace Inn has become an Old Town institution, popular with locals and celebrities alike. In the summer months, your body and spirit will be warmed in the beer garden that doubles the size of the place and could stand as its own sports bar and which is enormously popular for Bears games and the annual Wells Street Art Festival, as is the sidewalk café that offers the best people watching on Wells. As the name implies, the Fireplace Inn provides plenty of cozy warmth for your externals in winter via their namesake wood-burning centerpiece inside, while your internals will be warmed with some of the best ribs in the city.