What does a first-time visitor do with a free evening in Shreveport when the river walk has been walked and the casino floor has lost its novelty? The answer, for a certain kind of traveler who asks around rather than just Googling, tends to involve an elevator ride to the top of The Remington Suite Hotel on Texas Street.
The Remington sits in downtown Shreveport’s commercial corridor, a mid-rise that has housed oil executives, visiting politicians, and wedding parties for decades. The rooftop bar — informal by big-city standards, elevated by Shreveport’s — doesn’t announce itself aggressively. The lobby gives little away. But the bar upstairs draws a consistent crowd that includes local professionals unwinding after six o’clock, out-of-towners who stumbled onto it, and the occasional couple marking an anniversary with something more atmospheric than a chain restaurant.
The view is the first reason to go. Looking west and north, the Red River and the I-20 bridge spread out beneath you in a way that reframes Shreveport entirely. The city is flat and wide, and from up here that makes sense — the pine forests start somewhere beyond the horizon, and the river bends gently below. At dusk in October or March, when the humidity has relented, the light turns everything copper. It’s the kind of view that makes locals who’ve lived here thirty years say they forget how good it looks.
The bar program is the second reason. It’s not trying to be a craft cocktail destination, but the classics are made correctly and without fuss. The house old fashioned uses a decent bourbon and actual bitters. The wine list is short and functional. Beer selection leans on regional options alongside the standard domestics. Prices run what you’d expect from a hotel bar — call it twelve to sixteen dollars for a cocktail — without the inflated pretension some hotel bars adopt. The staff tends toward efficient and unhurried, which suits the pace of the room.
The third reason is harder to quantify but worth naming: the clientele tends to generate good conversation. Because the bar sits at the intersection of business travelers and locals who know what they’re doing on a Thursday night, the room has an easy mix that some bars spend years manufacturing and never quite achieve. It’s not loud. It’s not themed. It doesn’t have a DJ. People actually talk.
The rooftop is seasonal in its appeal — summer evenings in Shreveport run hot and thick, so the shoulder months from March through May and September through November represent the sweet spot. A weeknight visit around seven is quieter than weekends, when private events occasionally close portions of the space. Worth calling ahead or checking with the front desk if a private gathering is the last thing on the agenda.
Parking downtown is metered but forgiving after five, and the hotel’s garage is accessible off Commerce Street. The bar doesn’t serve a full kitchen menu, so arriving hungry is inadvisable, though light bites circulate. Think of it as a destination for the drink itself — and for the view, which on the right evening justifies the whole trip upstairs.
