Downtown & Union Plaza
The oldest core of the city, in the middle of a long, uneven comeback — and increasingly winning it.
The character of the place
- Early-20th-century bank towers and a 1930 movie palace, all within a few blocks.
- Ballpark nights, theater nights, and quiet Mondays — the district has moods.
- Walkable in a way almost nothing else in El Paso is.
Eat and drink here
All places →Café Central
$$$Fine dining · Downtown
Downtown’s long-running white-tablecloth room, with roots tracing back to a 1918 café across the river in Juárez.
Anson 11
$$$Steak & seafood · Downtown, in the historic Mills Building
Two restaurants in one restored 1911 office tower: a ground-floor bistro and a darker, pricier room upstairs.
Oak & Antler
$$American tavern · Downtown
An American tavern rooted in Southern cooking — comfort food, rustic technique, and a real cocktail list.
Lamezze
$$Mediterranean · Downtown, Stanton St
Mezze plates and steak bowls downtown, with a brunch that fills the room on weekends.
Sushiitto
$$$Japanese · Downtown, Hunt Plaza at WestStar Tower
Sushi, teppan and a chef’s table at the base of the tallest building in the city.
The Garrison
$$Cocktail bar · Downtown, San Antonio Ave
Downtown’s most serious cocktail room — a culinary approach to balance and technique, with food to match.
The Tiki Room
$$Tiki bar · Union Plaza, Downtown
El Paso’s original tiki bar: traditional Polynesian-style drinks, an enormous rum list, and Union Plaza outside the door.
Rosewood
$$Late-night lounge · Downtown, San Antonio Ave
A dim downtown lounge that keeps going well after the restaurants have turned the lights up.
The Berkeley
$$Cocktail lounge · Downtown
A specialty cocktail lounge downtown — quiet, deliberate, and not trying to be a club.
The Tap
$Dive bar · Downtown, San Antonio Ave
Dark, cheap, and honest — the downtown dive that outlasted every concept bar around it.
DeadBeach Brewery
$Brewery & taproom · Union Plaza, Downtown (brewery on Durazno Ave)
Downtown’s brewery anchor, with a taproom that fills up before and after ballgames.
Do this here
All things to do →El Paso Museum of Art
Art museum
A serious collection — European, American, Mexican colonial and contemporary border art — with free general admission.
El Paso Museum of History
History museum
The city’s own story, plus the Digital Wall — an interactive archive of El Paso photographs you can pull apart with your hands.
El Paso Holocaust Museum & Study Center
Memorial museum
A small, carefully built museum founded by a survivor who settled in El Paso.
The Plaza Theatre
Historic theater
A 1930 Spanish Colonial movie palace with a ceiling full of stars, saved from demolition and now the city’s marquee venue.
San Jacinto Plaza
City plaza
The heart of downtown, with Luis Jiménez’s fiberglass alligator sculpture standing in for the live ones that really lived here until 1965.
Downtown Arts District & Murals
Walkable district
Galleries, studios, and an open-air mural scene that runs from Union Plaza into Segundo Barrio and out to the Lincoln Park underpasses.
Southwest University Park
Ballpark
Home of the El Paso Chihuahuas, Triple-A affiliate of the San Diego Padres, and the downtown project that changed the neighborhood around it.
La Nube STEAM Discovery Center
Children’s museum & science center
A 70,000-square-foot cloud-shaped building full of bilingual, hands-on exhibits — El Paso’s first children’s museum and science center, opened in August 2024.
El Paso Mexican American Cultural Center
Cultural center
A three-story, $15 million cultural center built into the Main Library at Cleveland Square, opened in March 2025 after years of community pressure to build it.
Also worth knowing
- Elemi
- Café Central
- Anson 11
- Tabla
- DeadBeach Brewery
- The Tap
Nearby
- El Paso Museum of Art
- El Paso Museum of History
- Chihuahuas game
- Mural walk