Poblacion, Makati Is One of the "World's Coolest Neighborhoods" in 2021

Poblacion Dining Room opened in 2017. They were later known as Roastery, a coffee hangout inside Commune.

PHOTO BY Majoy Siason

(SPOT.ph) Far from the traffic jam and busy vibe of the Makati Central Business District lies a laid-back neighborhood that went from being a red-light district to a favorite hangout of college students and young professionals. The not-so-old ones call it Poblacion, while the younger generation refers to it with a very Gen Z name: Pobs or Pobla. The old downtown area in Makati City is home to a number of places to eat, stopovers for shopping and pampering, and a variety of things to do—so it doesn't come as a surprise that it's one of Time Out's "world's coolest neighborhoods in 2021."

Also read: The Urban Insider's Guide to Poblacion Makati City

Poblacion snagged the 46th spot out of 49 neighborhoods on their list. It's based on the results of their annual Time Out Index, which they've been doing in the past three years. This "huge, anonymous survey of urbanites all over the planet" polled around 27,000 city dwellers and asked local experts to rank "the greatest places for food, fun, culture and community" in the world.

Time Out editors especially lauded how Poblacion thrived even in this pandemic.

"The pandemic has made most indoor dining a no-go even now, but an array of outdoor galleries, rooftop bars and open-air art spaces mean it’s still pretty easy to have fun here. While several institutions have been forced to shut down over the past year, cherished haunts like Agimat Foraging and Kitchen Bar and Alamat have survived—expect tasty pulutan (Filipino tapas) and thoughtfully crafted cocktails," contributing journalist Shirin Bhndari wrote in the neighborhood's citation. She went on to describe a perfect day in Poblacion: eating goto at Goto Monster, strolling around Makati Poblacion Park, exploring Makati Museum and the 17th-century St. Peter's Church, and capping of the night at Agimat Foraging Bar.

Norrebro in Copenhagen topped the charts, while Mount Pleasant in El Arrayan in Santiago held on to the last place.

Time Out is a global magazine published by Time Out Group. They started out in Londin in 1968 and has since expanded their editorial recommendations to 328 cities in 58 countries worldwide.

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Source: Spot PH