Mimi Kakushi

Where the 1920s Never Quite Left

Step into Mimi Kakushi and the first thing that orients you is not the bar itself but the mood it has constructed around a very specific historical moment. The décor channels the Taisho-era convergence of East and West: the period when American jazz crossed the Pacific and landed in Osaka, when western fashions arrived not as imposition but as fascination. The name references the "mimi kakushi" hairstyle, the bob cut that became a sensation in 1920s Japan after traveling from the United States, and the room holds that reference lightly rather than hammering it into every surface. It is a considered starting point for an evening that unfolds with the same layered logic.

Dubai has absorbed Japanese restaurant-bars at a pace that makes differentiation difficult. The city now hosts enough izakaya-inflected concepts that the format risks becoming generic. Mimi Kakushi occupies a different position in that field: it anchors its identity in a documented cultural moment and builds outward from there, rather than using Japan as visual shorthand for minimalism or prestige. The result is a bar program with a coherent internal logic that you can trace through the glassware, the menu design, and the sequence of the evening itself.

The Ritual of the Drink: How the Menu Works

The cocktail program at Mimi Kakushi is designed to be read before it is tasted, and that sequencing matters. Previous menus arrived in the format of record covers, each sleeve paired with a cocktail and a song. The current iteration draws on the films of 1920s silent-screen actor Sessue Hayakawa, one of the first Asian performers to achieve mainstream recognition in Hollywood, a figure whose career embodied exactly the cultural crossing the bar is built around. Eleven cocktails are presented on movie reels, each drink represented both physically and visually in a format that prompts guests to engage with the concept before the glass arrives.

This is a specific kind of hospitality ritual: the menu as object, the pre-drink moment as part of the experience. In cities where bar programs compete on provenance and technique alone, this format adds a narrative layer that slows the ordering process in a productive way. You are not simply choosing a drink; you are choosing a scene, a character, a reference point. The pacing that follows tends to reflect that deliberateness.

The drink that crystallised the bar's reputation among the international awards circuit is the Kori Kakushi Martini. It is a dry martini made with gin infused with Japanese ume and a trace of vermouth, pre-batched and sealed into a small bottle that is then frozen inside a block of ice. At the table, the block is carved open to retrieve the bottle. The serve temperature is documented at -20°C. The theatricality is real, but it earns its drama because the temperature is not incidental: a martini held at that point has a different texture and release on the palate than a conventionally chilled version. The carving ritual is the kind of table moment that spreads quickly through social media, but the drink itself is what sustains the conversation beyond that first impression. It is the kind of signature serve that bars in New York, London, and Tokyo study closely when they see it place consistently on global lists.

Awards Context and Where Mimi Kakushi Sits Globally

The bar has appeared on the World's 50 Best Bars list in both 2023 and 2024, ranking at number 40 in both years, and moved to number 64 in the Top 500 Bars list for 2025. That sustained presence on two major rankings is meaningful in a category where placement can be volatile. It positions Mimi Kakushi in a peer set that includes programs with serious technical depth and deliberate conceptual frameworks, comparable in ambition to recognised bars such as Bar Leather Apron in Honolulu, Jewel of the South in New Orleans, and Julep in Houston, each of which has built its identity around a specific cultural reference point rather than a generalised luxury register.

Within Dubai specifically, the bar occupies a distinct tier. A city that offers high-volume beach clubs like Barasti Bar, late-night venues such as Boudoir, and pan-Asian concept bars like Buddha Bar Dubai has a wide spread of options across format and register. Mimi Kakushi sits in a smaller, more specialist category: low-capacity, concept-led, with a cocktail program that requires engagement rather than just consumption. For a fuller picture of where it sits in the city's drinking culture, see our full Dubai bars guide.

The Google review score of 4.5 across 862 ratings suggests the experience holds up beyond the awards circuit and repeat visits from industry voters. That consistency across a mixed audience, not just professionals attending industry events, is harder to maintain than a single good review cycle.

Food, Setting, and the Four Seasons Context

The bar operates within the Four Seasons Resort on Jumeirah's 23A Street. That address matters in a particular way: Four Seasons properties in the Middle East tend to attract a guest profile with high baseline expectations for both service and concept quality, which creates a productive pressure on in-house programming to deliver at a level beyond the standard hotel bar. Mimi Kakushi's described approach to food aligns with the "orient nouvelle" framing that governs the drinks: the food is award-winning according to the venue's documented recognition, though specific dishes are not available in our data. The broader dining and accommodation context for the area is covered in our full Dubai hotels guide and full Dubai restaurants guide.

Atmosphere has been compared by critics who have visited to a speakeasy-adjacent space, though the current direction in cocktail culture has largely moved past the hidden-door format. Mimi Kakushi's version of the concept is more referential than theatrical in its architecture: it uses period-appropriate visual cues rather than prohibition-era gimmickry, which keeps it from dating in the way that mid-2010s speakeasy formats have.

Planning Your Visit

A bar that has held a position inside the World's 50 Best Bars ranking for consecutive years will have a reservations situation that reflects that status. Walk-in access during peak evening hours on weekends is unlikely to be direct, and the experience is better served by planning ahead rather than treating it as a casual drop-in. The Four Seasons address on Jumeirah's 23A Street is accessible from the main coastal road and well-known to drivers and taxi services in the city. For those building a broader evening, the Jumeirah stretch connects to a range of dining and nightlife options; the Dubai experiences guide and Dubai wineries guide are useful for pre- or post-dinner planning. And if you want context on a different register of Dubai bar entirely, Ergo represents the more contemporary, spirits-forward end of the city's bar scene.

The bar is located inside a resort property, so attire expectations tend toward smart casual at minimum. The concept-driven format rewards guests who engage with the menu as intended: read the reel, ask about the serve, and allow the pacing of the evening to be shaped by the program rather than compressed into a quick drink between other stops.