2017 Annual Manual: Cincinnati City Guide
Photo: Jesse Fox
Welcome to Cincinnati
CityBeat’s Annual Manual is Cincinnati’s city guide: a local’s guide to living and a visitor’s guide to visiting. Whether you’re a lifelong resident, a recent transfer to one of our multiple Fortune 500 companies and myriad startups or just have a really long layover at CVG, what you’re holding in your hands is a (mostly) definitive guide to navigating life in the Queen City.
Our fair Midwestern metropolis is steeped in history, beer and bacon; Cincinnati is the birthplace of assorted specialty meats — goetta, aqueous chili, Montgomery Inn ribs — and home to the first professional baseball team (the 1869 Cincinnati Red Stockings), floating soap (Ivory), German-immigrant-approved beer (Christian Moerlein, et al) and America’s first female-run, large-scale manufacturing operation (Rookwood Pottery). Ohio River trade and the industrial boom built the bones of our town, an inimitable collection of Italianate and Art Deco architecture defining our 52 unique neighborhoods spread over seven hills.
As modern Cincinnati, we’re reclaiming the spirit of “if you can dream it, you can do it." Today, industrious locals and enthusiastic transplants are respectfully renovating our historic buildings and turning the city into an urban oasis of drinking, dining and shopping destinations on par with offerings from our big sister cities on the coasts. We’ve got breweries in old bottling plants and churches, succulent and staghorn fern shops in old gas stations, bars in former apothecaries and hip street food-style restaurants in defunct firehouses and post offices. And with almost four miles of city-center streetcar tracks connecting new amenities with downtown staples, the momentum looks to keep on building.
We hope that this 144-page reference book — our biggest one ever — helps to reinforce that locals and visitors are in the right place. The Annual Manual blends the usability of international travel guides with expert insights to collect and curate recommendations for things to eat, drink, see and do in each part of town and also offers comprehensive restaurant and bar listings, along with interesting attractions, independent shops and award-winning arts destinations.
Discover the latest additions to Cincinnati’s thriving cultural landscape and appreciate the people, places and things that have for so long made this bustling rivertown so great. Whether you’re here to stay or are just looking to pass some time, this handy manual should make you feel right at home.
— Maija Zummo, Project Editor
Read the entire Annual Manual here.
