Lubna is a listening restaurant and cocktail bar in a former industrial site near Fondazione Prada. Its semicircular glass room surrounds a 15-metre bar, while the vinyl booth and custom hi-fi system are set into concrete. The scale is far removed from a small jazz kissa, though the sound is treated as part of the architecture rather than an afterthought.
A different selector takes the booth each evening. Funk is the centre of the policy, with jazz, soul and ambient electronic music moving through the programme. Vinyl is the main playback format on the busier Friday-to-Sunday nights, and the selection is intended to sit alongside dinner and drinks without disappearing beneath them.
This is a social room with a restaurant, bar, art gallery and event space around it. It will suit listeners who prefer a long evening with food and conversation to a strict seat-facing-the-speakers ritual. The hardware brands remain unpublished, so the reason to go is the regular selection and the room’s deliberate focus on sound.