LIA Tavern is building Tini Bar, a 1960s-style martini bar, in its River North basement

Chef Justin Vaiciunas is building Tini Bar, a 1960s-style cocktail bar, in the basement beneath LIA Tavern, his tavern-style pizza restaurant at 11 W. Illinois St. in River North. He is aiming to open the bar in late November or early December, according to a What Now Chicago report published October 5, 2026.

The martini is the main event. Vaiciunas plans to pour martinis from a tap system routed through the ceiling, which he pitched as a different take on the freezer martinis and martini carts that have become popular at bars. “I wanted the martini to be a showpiece,” he said in a press release quoted by What Now Chicago.

Here is what the owners have announced so far, according to What Now Chicago.

• Tini Bar will take over the basement of LIA Tavern at 11 W. Illinois St.
• The bar is planned as a 30-seat room with a 1960s look.
• The target opening is late November or early December 2026.
• The drink list is expected to run 15 to 20 cocktails, with beer and wine as well.
• A six-drink guided cocktail tasting is in the works.

Martinis on tap and a Warhol house drink

The signature drink is the Warhol Martini, made with vodka and gin plus Mediterranean lemon, orange bitters and olive juice. The name fits the building. LIA stands for Life Imitates Art, and the restaurant upstairs has leaned hard on pop art. When Time Out Chicago reviewed LIA Tavern in October 2025, the critic described a pop-art-inspired tavern and listed a Warhol Martini served in a Campbell’s soup can among the artist-inspired drinks, along with a cocktail served in an actual paint can.

What Now Chicago reported that the menu for the guided tasting is still being written. The report did not include drink prices, hours, reservation details or how guests will reach the basement. The restaurant’s homepage made no mention of Tini Bar as of October 7. Vaiciunas told What Now Chicago he is hoping to open around late November or early December, and no firm date has been announced.

What city records show

The basement work has started to show up in city files. A permit issued September 10 through the city’s express program covers line-voltage electrical work in the basement: five circuits added to the existing 200-amp service and one new lighting outlet, at a reported cost of $4,858. The permit record lists the owner under the name Tavern LIA.

A second express permit, issued September 21, covers repair or in-kind replacement of four plumbing fixtures in the basement and first floor of one non-residential unit, and its conditions say no new fixtures may be added. That record names an individual as the tenant and does not mention the restaurant or the bar. As of October 7, the city’s permit data showed no larger renovation permit for the basement.

On the licensing side, city business license records show three licenses for Canvas Hospitality River North LLC, doing business as LIA, at the first-floor address. A retail food license was issued April 16, 2025, and a liquor license and a public place of amusement license followed on April 22, 2025. All three run through May 15, 2027. No license under the Tini Bar name appeared in the city’s data as of October 7.

The restaurant’s liquor license is the type the city calls Consumption on Premises – Incidental Activity. The city’s liquor licensing guide describes that license as the one for businesses where alcohol sales are secondary to a main activity, such as a restaurant. A separate tavern license covers places where selling drinks is the main business, such as a bar or lounge. The records do not say whether Tini Bar will run under the restaurant’s existing license.

From art-themed small plates to tavern pizza

LIA Tavern opened in June 2025, according to What Now Chicago. Vaiciunas and business partner Michael Mauro first announced the project simply as LIA in an April 2025 What Now Chicago report, which described chef-driven shared plates and tasting menus built on interpretations of artists’ work. In a May 2025 preview, The Infatuation said the menu would be split into small plates, large plates and vegetables, with installations by local artists and DJ sets.

In July 2025, ABC7 Chicago reported that the partners run Canvas Hospitality and that the restaurant was built around a rotating artist-in-residence program, with each featured artist shaping a tasting menu and hanging work on a gallery wall. By the time Time Out Chicago weighed in that October, the name was LIA Tavern and the menu led with tavern-style pizzas, along with pastas and mains such as roasted sea bass and Cajun roasted chicken. The review said the chef rewrites the menu every few months when a new resident artist arrives, and that a large painting by Vaiciunas hangs behind the bar.

Pizza is now the pitch. The restaurant’s website describes LIA Tavern as a thin-crust, tavern-style pizza spot with craft cocktails and gallery walls, and says walk-ins are welcome. In a WGN Daytime Chicago segment, Vaiciunas walked viewers through a pizza tasting menu built on miniature tavern-style pies, with toppings such as roasted delicata squash with goat cheese, za’atar chicken with tahini, and roasted pork belly with coconut milk and shaved fennel.

The chef behind the project

Vaiciunas is a Detroit native who cooked in Chicago, Salt Lake City, Miami and San Diego before taking a hotel executive chef job in Baltimore in 2020, Baltimore Fishbowl reported at the time. An FSR Magazine item from the same month said he trained in the culinary arts program at Schoolcraft College in Michigan, started his career at a Detroit athletic club and later worked as a corporate chef for a Chicago restaurant management company. FSR also said he opened the food and beverage program at a new San Diego hotel in 2018 and competed on the cooking show Cutthroat Kitchen in 2015.

Before LIA, Vaiciunas and Mauro opened a restaurant in Rochester Hills, Michigan, outside Detroit, according to the April 2025 What Now Chicago report. ABC7 Chicago described that place as a Jackson Pollock-inspired fine-dining restaurant. Vaiciunas told What Now that the Michigan restaurant was doing well and that the partners wanted to go bigger with their Chicago project.

The building on Illinois Street

LIA Tavern takes up the ground floor of a four-story brick and timber building with several tenants, as described in a 2014 city permit for a $300,000 ground-floor restaurant build-out. Earlier restaurant and liquor licenses for the first-floor space, held by other companies, ran from 2014 until August 2023, city license records show. Upstairs, the building’s owner received a permit on October 2, 2026, to turn a second-floor music studio into a single apartment with a new kitchen and shower, at a reported cost of $90,000, according to the permit record. The address is in the 42nd Ward.

Visiting LIA Tavern while the bar is built

The restaurant upstairs is open while the basement work goes on. These details come from LIA Tavern’s website and the restaurant’s OpenTable page.

• LIA Tavern is open Tuesday through Thursday from 5 to 10 p.m. and Friday and Saturday from 5 to 11 p.m.
• The restaurant is closed Sunday and Monday.
• The phone number is (312) 550-3425.
• OpenTable lists the price range as $31 to $50 per person.
• The Mona Lia, a seven-course tasting of tavern classics, pizzas and dessert, costs $60 and includes a drink, according to OpenTable.
• A $30 Girl Dinner deal on Tuesdays, Wednesdays and Thursdays includes a martini or spritz, a Caesar salad, truffle fries and a pizza or pasta.

How to get there

LIA Tavern is just west of State Street, and two L stations are within walking distance.

• The CTA Red Line’s Grand station at 521 N. State St. is one block north, at State Street and Grand Avenue.
• The Merchandise Mart station at 350 N. Wells St., on the Brown Line, is a bit less than half a mile southwest.
• Purple Line Express trains also stop at Merchandise Mart, but only during weekday rush periods.
• CTA bus routes 29, 36 and 65 connect at the Grand station, according to the CTA.
• OpenTable lists street parking for the restaurant.

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