Short North

The Short North Arts District is one of Columbus’ «gem attractions». This is a great place — especially during Gallery Hop (1^st Saturday of the month) to browse a number of art galleries and boutique stores. For my wife, the art galleries and boutiques are the main attraction. I go along for the food. There are so many great restaurants to try in the Short North (Mac’s, Press Grill, Short North Tavern, Melt, Stack City Burger and too many others to name them all. There are also some hi-​end restaurants like Hyde Park.
The biggest challenge when visiting the Short North is finding parking. Recently, we’ve been parking in the parking garage affiliated with one of the hotels near the North Market. The new convention center garage — when it’s completed — should help with the parking. The other option is to park closer to downtown and to ride the C-​bus. The C-​bus circulator runs a continuous loop thru the Brewery District, German Village and the Short North. C-​bus also lets you park once and then move from one area to another without moving your car.
Great place to visit.

Loved Short North! Great mix of shops (vintage, art galleries, toy shops), most were reasonably priced. Good food options. Parking was a little hard to find but besides that it was a great experience!

The one place where I always go when in Columbus. Whether it be daytime or nighttime it is a great spot in this city to discover something new.
Much like the South Side in Pittsburgh, the Short North is a vibrate place that has some of the best places to go. During the daytime you can eat, drink, and shop your way from one end to the other. Some of the best places to go are in this section of the city. I have easily spent a majority of my whole day milling around in the Short North.
For people like me, that’s ones from out of town, it’s kind of a one stop destination. On the one end you have the Arena District and Downtown areas bordering and at the other you have the university area bordering. Then on both sides you have some excellent neighborhoods that a filled with their own little culture. Because of this, I always stay in or near the Short North.
It’s definitely a bustling place filled with opportunities to keep you busy. You just have to figure out what exactly you want to do with your day, and then just do it.

Typical trendy urban downtown touristy kind of place. Lots of «cute» restaurants and shops with all the trendy iPhone type people walking around in their super fresh gear… while staring at their phones the entire time and everyone has headphones.
Wait… I also had headphones in, but I was by myself and I have a Samsung. Almost made it to the cool kids table.
I think this is a good «date night» place and something to show out of town friends. Probably going to be packed with college kids and tourists. And, as typical urban areas go, parking is complete crap. Good luck! Hope you like walking.
It’s a cool place, but if I lived in Columbus I’d probably rarely visit it.

The heart of Columbus! But certainly needs more bi level parking areas to accommodate to consumers — short north has a great feeling about it. Allot of art related shops, nice galleries and restaurants.

The Short North district is FANTASTIC. Lots of bars, restaurants, galleries, shopping. Tons of stores to stop in. We had a blast spending a Saturday afternoon walking around and checking it out. Worth the 2 hour drive.
Parking isn’t cheap if you’re there for a day, but I didn’t think the cost was that different than any other city parking.

This upper-​midlevel (did I make that up?) neighborhood isn’t for everyone. It’s busy, noisy, and full of trendy, sometimes seemingly fly-​by-​night establishments. But I feel that lately there have been some new businesses that seem built-​to-​last. Bakersfield and Oddfellows comes to mind. But then there are other new establishments like The Pint House that make me roll my eyes. Of course there are the old standbys like Bernard’s, Short North Tavern, Mac’s, etc. Nothing wrong with these places. I could take them or leave them personally, but I know that the crowds that frequent them are generally good people. But I hate to see places like La Fogata, with it’s world class terrible service and food, thrive. For my money, I like to hop over a few blocks to 4^th Street and hang out at St. James, 7^th Son, Little Rock, or Cray.

I love any night in the short north. Some of my favorite bars and places to eat are located here. Not to mention the craft beer and local mead.

My most favourite part of Columbus.
Such a favourite that I convince friends to drive the 2 hours up to Columbus every Gallery Hop where we eat way too much, drink way too much, and swear we’ll never do it again. .. Until the next Gallery Hop rolls around.
The complaints about parking are valid. Its limited and often expensive. But its worth it as you could spend the entire day here eating and drinking and shopping. And bee careful of resident-​only permit streets around here — they can get ya.
The new CBus circulator makes getting around the Short North super easy. And its free. Yeah. Free. So even if you don’t HAVE to take it. Jump on, take a ride, and see how easy taking the bus can be. Especially in the Short North where having a car is optional. Its just way too east to bus, walk, or bike just about everywhere here.
There are no shortage of restaurants of varying cuisines and the bars here range from classic cocktails to modern concoctions. There is really something for every taste.

If you are ever looking for somewhere in Columbus to be a local tourist, then this place is gold. It’s the epitome of Columbus Cool. It’s a real urban neighborhood nestled between downtown and the OSU campus. A seedy and unsafe area back in the day, this neighborhood has made a complete turn around.
I remember when the Short North looked like Livingston Avenue. This part of High Street was a nasty part of town. It was not the place for decent people to be in day or night. It was home to the poor, the derelicts, prostitutes and people up to no good hanging around.
But times have changed. Drawn in by the potential of the area, low rents and proximity to the new convention center, The Short North started turning around. Gentrified and revitalized, now it’s trendy, cool and expensive. Rents are rising but if you’ve got the money and you want walkable urban cool, you will have found your nirvana. Parking is a little tough but there’s easy access to public transportation and you can easily walk the entire neighborhood.
The area is ever changing so you may find your favorite is gone the next time you go there, but there’s likely to be a new favorite in it’s place. The dynamics of change are what are driving this area of Columbus.
Makes for a great safe area to hang out in for a while. Its got some really great little shops, galleries, restaurants, bars and clubs. Be sure to check out the Gallery Hop held every first Saturday of the month.

The good: I’ve lived in the Short North for a couple of years now, and there are a lot of things that I really love about the neighborhood. This is the first time I’ve actually had the chance to live in a walkable urban neighborhood, having been raised in Norcal suburbs and living in car-​centric LA/​Orange County for many years. Sometimes when the weather is fair and I’m working the day shift, I can go for days on end without using my car. There’s the farmers market at the North Market on Saturdays, a 30 minute walk to OSU, an equally brief stroll to the Basement or the LC for a concert, Goodale Park, the Northside library, Northstar Café, Brothers Drake, Tokyo GoGo, coffeeshops and people-​watching galore!
The bad: Parking can be tricky on weekend if you don’t have an assigned spot, and rent has been skyrocketing recently. Some of the newer renovations or constructions are charging upwards for $ 1000 for a one-​bedroom (and I thought I had left California housing prices behind). In my most recent apartment hunt, I must have tried for a dozen viewings, and many times the places were rented overnight, or even sight unseen. It can get extremely noisy and crowded on Gallery Hop, with solicitors and panhandlers turning out in force. There is also a lot of construction noise with the many developments that are taking place. Despite all the hustle and bustle, there’s a lot of turnover in the small retail shops along High St.

Growing up in Columbus as a child, the Short North used to be a pretty scary place. I recall from my childhood spending a weekend at a friend’s grandmother’s who lived in the area some fifteen or so years ago, and it was dreadful. Nowadays, after a major makeover/​gentrification, the neighborhood is nowhere near as frightening (unless your biggest fear is spending too much money. Haha! Get it? Because everything is EXPENSIVE). It is the trendiest neighborhood in the city, and where you go when you want to both see and be seen.
Perhaps the Short North’s most distinguished factor is that it is extremely pedestrian-​friendly. As one of the neighborhoods examined in Julie Campoli’s «Made for Walking,» the Short North (including its annexes Victorian Village, Italian Village, etc.) exists in a fine-​grained network of streets and sidewalks, human-​sized buildings and multiple green spaces. In fact, this is my favorite feature of the Short North. If other neighborhoods took a hint, you could walk anywhere in the city without looking like an indigent or someone with serious car trouble. Parking, meanwhile, can be a hassle, but if we had better transit in Columbus (read: rail transit), this wouldn’t be an issue, now would it?
Sadly, I think the neighborhood is appreciated more for its value as a status symbol than it is as a sustainable community. While there is still an artsy presence in the murals and remaining galleries (primarily on the northern end of High Street), the southern end has a far more gentrified feel, a place where people cruise in and out but not without spending loads of money. This area attracts a certain clientele that isn’t my favorite (though still more bearable than than the douchefest of nearby Park Street — yikes!). High-​end furniture and designer clothing is fine and dandy, but with little emphasis on more functional wares, and much on novelty — as another reviewer sums up more effectively — it’s hard to view the Short North as a 100% serviceable neighborhood… yet anyway.
But, in Columbus, it’s the place to be, which means you’ll come here whether I persuade you to or not.
Recommended destinations: North Market, Surly Girl Saloon, Betty’s, Mouton, The Brothers Drake, Level, Rivet, Flower Child, Barrel 44, Mac’s, Jeni’s, Marcella’s, Cup O’ Joe/​MoJoe Lounge, Goodale Park
Recommended to avoid: anywhere on Park Street
PS — if you hate gays, the Short North is not the place for you.

Way back in the day (I think it was probably late 2003) I had my very first experience visiting Columbus, Ohio with friends. We had ventured down to the Short North for the monthly Gallery Hop. I remember falling in love with the funky vibe and gay friendly atmosphere. It was so different than the rest of the Midwest. It reminded me of the small neighborhood off Fillmore in San Francisco I had briefly lived in with my mom and brother. My barely 18-​year-​old self fell in love.
It was a very different place then than it is now, but it is still equally magical. It’s safer, cleaner, more alive than ever before. The city and the community have done so much to revitalize the area. I’m loving the new street art I see going up on the buildings. I dug the little Short North Pole theme they had for the holidays. The restaurants, bars, shops, they all come together to make it a really neat area to explore when you have time to kill.

I know where I want to be in Columbus, and it’s here.

This being the «downtown» in Clumbus that took a whole lot getting used to.
The restaurants are alot of dive bars with a few exclusive food offerings mixed with alot of vintage.
I am used to downtowns being full of your usual chain shops, and the same stuff in every corner like every other city.
Not here, you can walk to North Market, one of the best on the planet, window shop while you stroll or eat from any ethnic food group you want.
Though in my year in Columbus I never bought anything other than food here I still loved to browse and wander.

Favorite stomping ground!

Hip, trendy, and teeming with youthful energy*, the Short North Arts District features many boutiques, bars, galleries, and eateries not at all found elsewhere. Lovely arches adorn this stretch of High Street. I especially love Marcella’s Ristorante and Tigertree, and some rather elegant art galleries nestle among grittier or more provocative ones. The Short North is where little twenty-​four-​year-​old me would rather spend her free time than the immediate periphery off the campus of Ohio State. Many stereotypically liberal-​lookin’ folks abound in the arts district, but *this* particularly strait-​laced, moderate-​to-​conservative Democrat isn’t complaining. Bring your out-​of-​town guests here; this is *the* «it» spot for all those who can (legally) drink.
*Yes, I realize I’m far from the first person to describe the SN as such, but in using such clichés I merely affirm the inevitable truth that the Short North *is* what’s happenin’ in Columbus, Ohio.

Short North has shown me what Cincinnati’s Gateway Quarter will be like in another five years. Like Short North, our Gateway Quarter was riddled with crime and known as a squatters’ neighborhood before it began revitalization ten years ago. We’ve come a long way since then, with a portion resembling the artistic and local eateries found in Short North. But there are still several blocks that need improvement.
Here’s where a visit to Short North becomes inspiring. Having been in the same boat, but just working at it longer, Short North is at least three times as big as the rejuvenated Gateway Quarter. It’s exciting to see vitality in the neighborhood, to see swarms of people out during Gallery Hop, and to see many local businesses opening up shop in this once desolate area.
If you’re coming to Columbus, this is definitely THE place to explore.
Some of my favorite businesses:
For eating:
— Lemongrass
— Surly Girl Saloon
— La Fogata
— Jeni’s Ice Cream
— Northstar Café
— Chocoholique
— MoJoe
For shopping:
— Flower Child
— Tigertree
— North Market
— Funky & Functional

I enjoy living in the Short North. It is central for my work — I’m always traveling the opposite direction of the morning rush hour! There are several things to do and see, within a two mile radius. Galleries, restaurants, sporting events, dancing, cultural events, etc. biking and walking is popular here — the OSU campus starts about half a mile above the Short North, thus when there’s nice weather, people are always outside! There are a plethora of restaurants — American, Indian, Italian, German, sushi, Thai, fats food, pizza joints, gourmet street carts — you name it, I’m sure you can find it here.

The Short North, just for clarification, consists of High only; it’s a shared corridor with Italian Village on the east side of High and Victorian Village on the west side, both with their own flavors once you leave High. The neighborhood is commonly regarded as both the city’s best urban neighborhood and as a great example of urban revitalization, which in recent years has taken a gentrification slant with a good deal of expensive establishments moving in and changing the artsy character of the neighborhood. You know this is the case when numerous galleries during the last Gallery Hop didn’t even bother to be open in the evening, so you can imagine my new San Franciscan roommate being confused since this wasn’t the case just a few months ago.
The Short North, for all its touted «vibrancy», is rather quiet outside of weekend evenings and could use just a bit more hustle and bustle. A little more focus on utilitarian goods (try buying some basic hardware here) vs. luxury goods would probably do the trick. There are still a decent number of places worth checking out for sure. Basically, the northern half of the neighborhood is less gentrified, but still healthy and retains the feel of what the southern half used to be like more or less. There are even some old standbys back from when this was the worst neighborhood in the city and by that I mean you would rather walk down Cleveland Ave at night in a heartbeat than walk down High in the Short North in broad daylight.
The Short North was a sh! tstorm of all the worst things that could befall an urban neighborhood. Public transit was ripped out, businesses left the neighborhood, and residents followed them on the new shiny «free“ways out to the problem-​free way of futuristic living: suburbia. The neighborhood became ground zero for undesirables like drug dealers, hustlers, muggers, etc and on top of that you had the projects plopped right here too, which was simply social experimentation imposed on vulnerable and low-​income individuals who had to live in the same complexes with the aforementioned denizens, who I’m sure had no qualms about their subsidized housing. A former resident of Victorian Village who I spoke with recalled the time when he lived there back in the 80’s and saw a guy get shot in the face on High, which matched the other horrible incidents I had read about like women being raped in Goodale Park and one elderly man being beaten within an inch of his life for what little money he had in his wallet. The transformation of the neighborhood has been so great that you wouldn’t recognize old pictures of the area without a local landmark giving its location away.
The present day Short North has been seeing rents go way up for businesses and residents alike. Columbus residents tend to brush it off and say that all of the creative types that lived there will just move in to another run-​down business district and voila: the same process will occur like clockwork. Unfortunately, there is no large urban business district that is emerging to fill the void of the more alternative Short North. Columbus should, like numerous other cities between the coasts, have a variety of blossoming Short North-​type business districts, which is a big reason why the neighborhood gets 4 stars, not 5. If you’re going to be a city’s one and only arts/​dining/​boutique district of any significant size, then you better live up to the hype and I’m just not convinced that the Short North makes up for all of the rest of the long empty urban business districts (eight) on every other major street branching out of Downtown. Even so, it has no rival coming anywhere close in its sister Ohio cities of Cleveland and Cincinnati.