Lulu's Waikiki

Where Kalākaua Meets the Coast

Lulu's Waikiki is an open-air, oceanfront restaurant at 2586 Kalākaua Avenue, overlooking Waikiki Beach. The Pacific sits in the foreground here: breakfast and coffee in the morning, happy hour after the beach, dinner with a view, and live local music as the night stretches on. Mondays run late for Industry Monday, a weekly night for Hawaiʻi's restaurant community.

That oceanfront perch is the point of the address. Waikiki's Kalākaua strip mixes hotel dining rooms that ask for advance planning with high-volume rooms that live on foot traffic. Lulu's sits in the informal middle of that corridor, an upstairs, beach-facing room whose setting does a large share of the work.

Island-Inspired, Open-Air Dining

The kitchen serves island-inspired food and cold drinks from breakfast through late night, with extensive gluten-conscious, dairy-conscious, and vegan options. Community giveback runs through a monthly program with Hawaiʻi nonprofits, and the restaurant is Ocean Friendly Certified.

This is a different register from the tasting-menu ambitions of Fête (New American) or the occasion-dining positioning of 53 By The Sea. The beach-facing energy and the casual format are the draw, not a compromise.

Honolulu's Casual Coastal Tier

Across the American dining scene, casual waterfront rooms have proven durable. At the high-commitment end, venues like Le Bernardin in New York City, The French Laundry in Napa, and Providence in Los Angeles command planning and occasion-level investment. Farm-to-table destination formats like Blue Hill at Stone Barns in Tarrytown and Single Thread Farm in Healdsburg have made sourcing and seasonality the central argument. Tasting-menu formats at Alinea in Chicago, Lazy Bear in San Francisco, and Atomix in New York City have refined the pre-booked, multi-course experience. None of that is what this stretch of Waikiki is doing.

Hawaii's beach-adjacent dining culture draws on a long multicultural food history. 3660 On the Rise is one Honolulu fine-dining reading of that heritage; an open-air Kalākaua room like Lulu's is a looser, walk-up reading of the same coastline.

Wine and the Casual Waikiki Room

On Honolulu's more serious dining addresses, wine-program depth can be a credential of the kind associated with The Inn at Little Washington or Addison in San Diego. Visitors chasing sommelier-led, vertically organized lists, including internationally recognized programs like 8 1/2 Otto e Mezzo Bombana in Hong Kong, will be better served elsewhere in the city. (our full Honolulu restaurants guide).

Planning a Visit

The restaurant is at 2586 Kalākaua Avenue, Honolulu, HI 96815, upstairs over Waikiki Beach. Come in the morning for breakfast and coffee, after the beach for happy hour, for dinner with a view, or for live local music; Mondays stay open late for Industry Monday. Cultural programs with a luau-format approach, such as the Ahaaina Luau, offer a structured Hawaiian cultural evening rather than this walk-up oceanfront room. For Honolulu's wider range, 855-ALOHA and chef-driven casual rooms such as Emeril's in New Orleans show how far the category runs across cities and formats.