The cocktail menu at Field Day is a leather-bound book stamped with a keystone. Haridelle's Kylie Silvestri designed it, and it holds 36 cocktails sorted into highballs, martinis, shaken, stirred, dessert drinks and nightcaps. Each drink comes with its backstory and a key showing where the ingredients came from and how they were processed. There's another menu next to it. It lists nine drinks, all $15, with no notes.
Danny and Katie Childs opened Field Day at 923 N. Second St. on Oct. 21. Field Day has a destination bar's credentials, but the room is laid out for people who live a few blocks away and stop in on a weeknight.
A Destination Bar in a Neighborhood That Rarely Gets One
The Inquirer's opening story described Northern Liberties' food and drink scene as long anchored by Ortlieb's and Standard Tap, with standouts like Pietramala, Pera and Apricot Stone. It also said that scene has been "dwarfed" by Fishtown and Kensington, where buzzy openings happen regularly. The same paper called Field Day one of the most anticipated bars of the year.
That kind of attention brings in people from across the city, and the Field Guide is written for them. Danny Childs won a James Beard Award for his book Slow Drinks, which describes a farm- and field-to-bar approach he developed over nine years at Farm & Fisherman Tavern in Cherry Hill. He later used it as a consultant at Almanac and La Jefa. At Field Day the method turns to Philadelphia and the surrounding region. One drink is a clarified cream soda cocktail flavored with shagbark hickory bark from Tewksbury, N.J. Another is a martini made with brown butter, sweet Jersey corn miso and lacto-fermented beech mushrooms from Kennett Square. There's also an orange crush made with wild persimmons from the Childses' own backyard.
The rest of the business is set up for regulars.
Nine Drinks, No Notes
The Inquirer's subhead counts 45 cocktails. The Field Guide accounts for 36, and the other nine make up the "$15 Holler" list, which the owners aimed at locals who drop in for a casual drink and a bite.
| The Field Guide | The $15 Holler | |
|---|---|---|
| Drinks | 36 cocktails | 9 cocktails |
| Format | Leather-bound book with sourcing notes and a technique key | A short list with no notes |
| Examples from opening week | Bourbon with birch beer, rum with clarified cream soda, sherry with black cherry wishniak | A fig-leaf daiquiri and a cosmo made with Pine Barrens cranberries |
The counts and formats come from the Inquirer's opening story. The drink examples come from Philadelphia Magazine's opening preview.
The drinks beyond the cocktail lists point the same way. Field Day makes its own sodas, kombucha and lemonade. It also pours coffee, tea, wine, Guinness and a house lager brewed by Tonewood. Philadelphia Magazine reports that Farm & Fisherman regulars will recognize the Cel-Rey, Childs's mix of mezcal and celery soda.
Childs explained the two-menu setup to the Inquirer:
"We want anybody to walk in here and feel welcome, and that it's not like they're going to school, that they're just at a great bar. And if they want to learn more, they can."
Every Bar Seat Is Held for Walk-Ins
Field Day takes reservations through Resy, but about half of its seats, including all 20 at the bar, are held for walk-ins. For someone a short walk from Second Street, that means a bar seat at one of the year's most anticipated openings doesn't depend on booking ahead.
The hours fit the same pattern. Field Day is open 4 p.m. to midnight Wednesday through Saturday and 4 to 8 p.m. on Sunday. Closing at 8 on Sunday makes it a place for an early dinner. The kids' menu also works for families: it comes with a botanical-themed coloring page and crayons. Philadelphia Magazine reported that family-friendly goal back in May, when the bar was still a project said to be more than a year in development.
The design is personal too. Katie Childs oversaw it with Laura Weiszer of Betsu Studio. Walnut shelves above the bar hold travel souvenirs and family heirlooms, including both of their great-grandfathers' bottle cappers. One great-grandfather brewed sassafras root beer and the other made dandelion wine.
Regional Cooking With Philly Basics
The dining room seats 50, and the business has 25 employees, so the Inquirer called Field Day as much a restaurant as a bar. Chef Melissa McGrath, known for Sweet Amalia, runs the kitchen. She was a 2023 James Beard semifinalist for Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic for her cooking at that roadside market and restaurant in Newfield, N.J. Sous chef April McGreger handles preserving, and her pickle plate is already a standout. Jamaar Julal splits his time among the kitchen, the bar and an upstairs R&D lab, where he runs fermentation projects.
The menu draws on Appalachia, Lancaster County, South Jersey and the Shore, and the Chesapeake Bay. Most of the opening-week dishes would still make sense on an ordinary weeknight:
- Soft pretzels with Calabrian pub cheese and lager mustard
- The "Philly Dip," garlic pork shoulder with long hots, broccoli rabe and sharp provolone on sourdough
- Thick tomato pie made with Jersey tomatoes and oregano from the owners' backyard
- Hoagie salad with salami, olives, sharp provolone and tomato-pie croutons
- A pumpkin-spicebush soft serve sundae with corn silk caramel and pumpkin seed brittle
- Boozy gelati made with pawpaw water ice, Lancaster sweet cream soft serve and rum
The Inquirer added Lebanon bologna sandwiches on sourdough English muffins, a seasonal Roman-style "field pie," skillet chocolate chip cookies and a Concord grape water ice. The menus change with the seasons, so some of these will rotate off. The kitchen tries to waste nothing, so leftover tomato pie at the end of the night gets turned into miso.
What Else Changed on Second Street This Fall
Field Day isn't in a new building. It took over a former auxiliary space of Cescaphe Ballroom. Cescaphe still books tours of the ballroom at 923 N. Second St., so the address now has an event venue for big occasions and a walk-in bar on the ground floor.
A little farther up the street, the Starbucks at 1018 N. 2nd St. has closed. PhillyVoice listed it among businesses that shut down in the weeks before its Oct. 14 roundup.
At Piazza Alta, Terra Grill at 1099 Germantown Ave. was set to open on Friday, March 27, 2026, according to PhillyVoice. By summer it was up and running, and the Inquirer reviewed it in July. The Buttery, which already has locations in Malvern, Ardmore and Bryn Mawr, announced a Piazza Alta location at the same address. Its owners said they were drawn to Northern Liberties as a walkable neighborhood. As of the Inquirer's fall openings forecast in mid-September, the café hadn't shared an opening date. Its website still lists only the three Main Line locations.
Together, these changes give the 900 block of North Second a weeknight anchor that wasn't there in the summer. Field Day's opening slipped from a September target to Oct. 21, so the place is still new. The menus will keep changing with the seasons.
If you're already out on a weekend morning, the Liberty Lands compost drop-off runs Saturdays from 11 a.m. to noon at North 3rd and West Wildey streets. The Nov. 7 listing on the Northern Liberties Neighbors Association calendar says pumpkins are accepted. NLNA has also scheduled a neighborhood cleanup for Saturday, Nov. 21, to tidy the streets before Thanksgiving.
A new place to walk to is part of a home's story, and a good listing tells it. If you're thinking about selling a home within walking distance of Second Street, Michael Prince can tell you how the corridor's new openings fit into your pricing and marketing. List with Michael.
