Wijnbar ONA

Two Rooms, One Consistent Argument for Ghent as a Wine Bar City

Ghent's drinking culture has long operated in the shadow of its restaurant scene, which draws the louder international press. The city's wine bars, by contrast, tend to accumulate reputations gradually, through word of mouth and the kind of sustained local patronage that doesn't translate easily into rankings. Wijnbar ONA is an exception to that quiet trajectory. Appearing on Star Wine List's annual rankings in 2023, 2024, and 2025, across multiple positions within each year's list, it has built a record of external recognition that places it in a distinct tier among Belgian wine bars, and gives Ghent a credible claim to that category in a country where Brussels and Antwerp typically absorb most of the attention.

The Architecture of a Wine Bar That Has Room to Breathe

The original ONA address on Nederkouter 71 established the format: a wine bar scaled for conversation rather than volume, where the physical proportions of the room enforce a kind of intimacy that larger venues can only approximate. That spatial restraint is one of the defining characteristics of Ghent's most considered hospitality addresses, a city that has historically preferred the well-appointed room over the sprawling one.

The second location, now open on Belfortstraat 29 in the city centre, shifts that equation deliberately. Where the Nederkouter space is defined by its contained scale, Belfortstraat is designed with events and workshops in mind, offering the kind of floor area that allows ONA to host programming, tastings, producer visits, educational sessions, that would have strained the original site. This is not a simple replication of the first address. It is a different spatial argument: that a wine bar, at a certain point in its development, needs infrastructure for ideas as much as it needs room for glasses.

Move toward a second, more capacious location tracks a pattern visible across Europe's more serious wine bar operators. In cities from Copenhagen to Lyon, the wine bars that have moved from neighbourhood fixture to broader cultural relevance have typically done so by adding programming capacity rather than simply expanding their by-the-glass lists. ONA's Belfortstraat opening reads as a similar calculation: the wine list earns the room, but the room earns the institution.

What the Star Wine List Record Implies About the Programme

Star Wine List operates as an international guide focused specifically on wine lists, and its annual rankings distinguish between venues on the strength of their list depth, range, producer selection, and overall curation. Appearing at multiple positions within a single year's rankings, as ONA has done consistently across 2023, 2024, and 2025, is not a function of visibility alone. It reflects a list that holds up to repeated scrutiny rather than one that earned a single strong year and coasted.

The wine bar programmes at that tier typically emphasise producer-level curation: growers with limited distribution, regional appellations that don't appear on standard restaurant lists, and a by-the-glass selection that rotates in response to what's arriving rather than what's comfortable to stock.

Belgium's broader fine dining circuit, represented by addresses like Hof van Cleve in Kruishoutem, Boury in Roeselare, and Zilte in Antwerp, has long maintained strong relationships with independent wine producers, particularly from Burgundy, the Loire, and the northern Rhône. Wine bars that serve that dining culture well tend to stock accordingly. ONA's positioning within Ghent places it in a city that takes those reference points seriously.

Ghent's Wine Bar Context

Ghent is a university city with a strong independent hospitality culture, and its wine bars tend to reflect that: they lean toward the producer-focused and the curious rather than the prestige-label and the conventional. The city's compact historic centre, where Belfortstraat sits a short walk from the Korenmarkt and the Graslei, concentrates a significant number of its leading addresses within a walkable radius, which makes an evening that moves between stops genuinely viable rather than logistically aspirational.

For visitors building a Ghent itinerary around eating and drinking, the city rewards a mix of formats. The restaurant scene, which includes addresses like Boon, Ferri, Debra, Ce's Arts, and Epiphany's Kitchen, offers enough range that a wine bar with serious programming functions as a complement rather than a compromise. ONA, across both locations, sits squarely within that ecosystem. More context on where it fits within the city's broader hospitality offer is available through our full Ghent bars guide, and for those planning around accommodation, our full Ghent hotels guide maps the relevant options by neighbourhood.

Those coming specifically for wine might also find value in our full Ghent wineries guide, while our full Ghent restaurants guide and our full Ghent experiences guide cover the surrounding context in more depth. For reference points outside Belgium, the wine programming at addresses like Le Bernardin in New York City or the hospitality culture around Bozar Restaurant in Brussels offers useful comparative framing for the level of list seriousness that sustained Star Wine List recognition tends to imply.

Planning a Visit

ONA operates across two addresses: Nederkouter 71 for the original wine bar, and Belfortstraat 29 for the newer, event-ready centre location. Given that the Belfortstraat space is described as oriented toward events and workshops in addition to regular service, visitors with specific programming in mind should confirm scheduling directly with the venue ahead of travel, particularly for weekends or periods when the calendar is likely to be full. For a standard visit to either address, Ghent's compact centre means ONA is accessible on foot from most of the city's main hotels and from the central train station within a reasonable walk. Further reading on the surrounding area is available through Willem Hiele in Oudenburg and Bartholomeus in Heist for those extending a Belgian itinerary beyond Ghent, or Emeril's in New Orleans as a reference for what event-integrated hospitality can look like at scale.