Urban Discoveries Baltimore

High time Charm City got itself a stylish new diner. There are a scant handful already, and we admit to loving every bite of their greasy goodness–Pete’s Grille in Waverly, unmatched for breakfast-hours breakfast; the Paper Moon Diner in Charles Village, which has sadly cut back on its former all-night hours; and Never on Sunday in Mt. Vernon, which is great except on… But soon the Charles Theatre and the Club Charles will get that fuzzy, completed feeling with the birth of the third marvel in the hipster trifecta: Lost City Diner.

Located at 1730 Charles Street in the booming Station North neighborhood, Lost City Diner has been teasing locals for months now with subtle but increasingly apparent signs of life. For those whose notion of diner-hood was locked in circa The Wild One, keep holding your breath. Lost City won’t feature the poodle skirts, Elvis records, and communist fear-mongering so many of us fondly associate with classic 50s-era diners. It’s going another route: 1930s science fiction. Think dawn of comic books; think twilight of Art Deco; think discovery of Pluto (R.I.P.). Between this soon-to-be born diner and her stumbling-distance neighbors, scene-seeking Baltimoreans may never have to hit D.C. again.

And there’s more good news. If you mourned the sudden loss of the nearby Zodiac Restaurant (felled tragically by a ruptured gas line), you can stop gnashing your teeth now. Zodiac chef Christina DiAngelo has already signed on to prepare vegan-friendly (!) cuisine for the new diner. So for now, dust off your best Lugosi impression and warm up your time machine. Let’s just hope that Lost City takes a cue from its surroundings and gives us the honest-to-Cthulhu late-night diner we’ve been waiting for.

We’re hoping for some stellar milkshakes and incredibly crispy fries. What’s on your diner must-have list?

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