Neko Neko

Smith Street and the Fitzroy Dining Corridor

Smith Street has spent the better part of twenty years consolidating its reputation as Melbourne's most reliably interesting dining strip. The northern end, where Neko Neko sits at 83A, operates differently from the Brunswick Street axis: less curated, more transactional in the leading sense, with a mix of long-standing neighbourhood rooms and newer arrivals that have learned to compete on substance rather than spectacle. This is a street where Belles Hot Chicken Fitzroy draws queues for a format that has stayed focused since it opened, and where the Builders Arms Hotel has held its position as a neighbourhood anchor across different eras of the suburb's transformation. Neko Neko entered this context at 83A.

What Fitzroy does well, across its better addresses, is resist the pressure to perform for a tourist audience. The suburb's dining rooms tend to read the local customer first. That orientation shows up in format choices, pricing signals, and the degree to which a room feels designed for return visits rather than first impressions. Neko Neko's placement on Smith Street puts it in direct conversation with that tradition, whether or not it consciously positions itself that way.

The Room and What Fitzroy Expects of It

Approaching 83A on Smith Street, the surrounding block gives you the register before you arrive at the door. This stretch of Fitzroy has the kind of low-key density that Melbourne does better than most Australian cities: shopfronts that have been repurposed without being erased, foot traffic that moves at a pace that allows you to look rather than rush. The physical character of the street sets an expectation that the interior will follow a similar logic, prioritising material and proportion over decorative ambition.

Fitzroy's better rooms have generally moved away from the stripped-industrial shorthand that defined inner Melbourne hospitality in the early 2010s. The current mode, across peer venues in the neighbourhood, is something closer to considered restraint: spaces that feel deliberate without announcing their deliberateness. Cutler & Co. on Gertrude Street established a benchmark for this approach in Fitzroy years ago, using a former metalworks in a way that acknowledged the building's history without turning it into a theme. The standard that set has been useful for the suburb's subsequent arrivals, including those working at a different scale and price point.

Where Neko Neko Sits in the Neighbourhood's Eating Culture

Fitzroy's eating culture has always been pluralist. The suburb holds Casa Iberica Deli, which has been selling Spanish provisions on Johnston Street for decades and represents a kind of culinary continuity that most Australian suburbs cannot claim. It also holds Marion Wine, which sits at a different register entirely, built around a natural wine program and small-plate format that speaks to a younger, more internationally informed customer. The range between those two reference points is wide, and Smith Street occupies a middle ground within it.

Venues that work on Smith Street tend to have a clear point of view without requiring their customers to share every part of it. The street rewards specificity. A room that tries to be everything to everyone tends to get bypassed in favour of neighbours that have made a sharper editorial decision about what they are and who they are for. On that measure, Neko Neko's address alone puts it in a competitive frame that demands a clear answer to the question of format and positioning.

For context on where Fitzroy's dining sits within the broader Victorian restaurant picture, rooms like Brae in Birregurra and Provenance in Beechworth represent the regional end of the state's serious dining conversation, while Attica in Melbourne holds the high-recognition end of the city's own output. Fitzroy operates in a band between those poles, where the expectation is neighbourhood-level consistency rather than destination-level theatre. That is not a lesser ambition; it is a different discipline, and one that Smith Street's better addresses have learned to execute across years of service rather than opening months.

Nationally, the comparison set for what serious neighbourhood dining looks like extends to rooms such as Ormeggio at The Spit in Mosman, Pipit in Pottsville, and Botanic in Adelaide, each of which has found a way to hold a local customer base at a high level of craft without defaulting to destination-dining formats. The ambition is different but the discipline required is comparable.

Planning a Visit

Neko Neko is located at 83A Smith Street, Fitzroy, in the heart of a corridor that rewards walking. The surrounding block contains enough eating and drinking options that an evening here can extend well before or after the meal itself, with Marion Wine on the nearby stretch useful for a pre-dinner glass if the timing allows. Smith Street is well served by tram from the CBD, and street parking on the surrounding grid is easier in the earlier part of the evening than later. For a fuller picture of what the neighbourhood offers across different formats and price points, the EP Club Fitzroy restaurants guide maps the current field in detail.

Given the venue's position on a street where the better rooms book solidly through Thursday to Saturday, planning ahead is advisable if you have a fixed date in mind. Walk-in availability tends to be more accessible earlier in the week, which is when Smith Street's neighbourhood character is most apparent, with a customer base that is local rather than occasion-driven.