Loullie

Loullie is the version of a Tel Aviv beach club that trades the towel on the sand for a raised deck and a proper menu. It stands on the promenade above Gordon beach at HaYarkon Street 121, a wooden terrace that points straight at the horizon, and it calls itself a beach club, a sunset bar and a wellness spot rolled into one. That mix tells you what it is chasing: not the volume of the free sand below, but a slower, smarter seat with the same sea in front of it.

My reading, and the line I hold on the Tel Aviv beach clubs directory, is that Loullie is a destination for the meal and the light rather than a place to spend a whole cheap beach day. Tel Aviv gives its sand away and rents loungers for pocket money, so what you pay for at Loullie is the deck, the kitchen and the moment the sun goes down over the water.

Come in the daytime and Loullie is a calm, sun warmed deck where the wellness angle and the brunch make more sense than the party billing suggests. The menu that chef Kfir Yanin put his name to runs from an acai bowl with banana to a schnitzel challah, the kind of range that keeps a long table happy, and you eat it on a terrace with nothing between you and the Mediterranean. This is the quiet Loullie, and for a food and scene wanderer it is the one worth arriving early for.

The hinge of the day is the happy hour. From four to seven, Sunday through Thursday, the one plus one drinks and the discount on food pull a crowd in just as the light starts to soften, and the room shifts from lunch to something closer to a bar. Time your arrival for the start of that window and you get the best of both, a relaxed table and the beginning of the sunset scene without paying the full evening rate.

After dark Loullie becomes the sunset bar it advertises. A DJ works the deck, the volume climbs, and reviewers who love the place talk about the music and the atmosphere in the same breath as the view. That is also where the honest caveats sit. Diners repeatedly flag the prices as high even for this city, some find the music loud once the evening gets going, and service can lag when the deck is full, so this is a spot for a considered evening, not a spontaneous cheap one.

Where Loullie falls short is the flip side of what it is. It is not a place to sprawl on a sunbed all day for a few shekels, and it does not try to be, so if that is your Tel Aviv beach plan the answer is the free Gordon sand below or the easy bars up the front rather than this deck. Come to Loullie for a meal, a drink and the sundown, and it earns its keep.

Gordon is the heart of the Tel Aviv beachfront, a wide stretch of soft sand between the marina and Frishman, with usually gentle swimming, lifeguards in season, and the saltwater Gordon pool at its northern edge. The sand is free, the loungers are inexpensive, and the promenade behind it carries the whole parade of the city down to the water, which is exactly the scene Loullie looks out over from its deck. Our full Gordon beach guide covers the swimming, the pool and where to sit for less.

Loullie is on the promenade at HaYarkon Street 121, in the thick of the central beachfront, so most people simply walk from a Gordon or Frishman hotel or step off the seafront path. There is no beach parking to speak of on the front itself, and a taxi or a short walk from the city grid is the sensible way in. Booking is a table reservation rather than a bed rental, made through the venue’s online link or by phone, and it is worth doing for a sunset table or any weekend evening when the deck fills.

Want the sundown seat settled before you go? Send your date and party size below and we will ask Loullie directly, coming back with a table time, whether the happy hour applies and anything to know for the evening, at no charge to you.