After a historic tour of the Edmondston-Alston house, I dedicated the next day to three iconic culinary destinations. For lunch: the beloved Bertha’s Kitchen, a Black-owned cathedral to soul food, for a steaming bowl of okra stew and fried chicken. For drinks and bites: the bar at Husk. I wailed along to Beck’s “Loser” and Etta James’ “I’d Rather Go Blind,” slurping down wood-fired oysters and coconut-washed bourbon drinks, and dining on a dazzling dish: tuna tartare over rice, topped with smoked roe, koji mayo, and crispy potato strings. For dinner: Fig, the restaurant equivalent of a warm kiss on a cold night. Surrounded by burnished mirrors and oxblood walls, I enjoyed a tangy chopped cabbage salad laden with pickled shiitake and a too-delicate-for-this-earth scallop dish.

Vern’s was the next day’s brunch destination, in the hushed neighborhood of Elliotborough, where Spanish moss coats the trees and every house feels like Miss Havisham’s. I had a smoked salmon with a lip-smacking lime yogurt on sourdough alongside a bouncy gnocchetti in a rich, savory pesto, under a ceiling crisscrossed in dark, glossy wood. After a stroll through Hampton Park, I visited Sullivan’s Island to see the beach, which was gray and misty that afternoon. Back downtown, I stopped into Farside Vintage to buy an old Coogi jacket, loud and deranged with giant patches of a joker and a king. I experienced the hotel’s Caviar Bar for a drink and bites, a romantic outdoor experience featuring spreads like Regiis Ova caviar with all the fixings. Their Cala-Luya Classic (gin, calamansi, ginger, yuzu, quatre épices) was a masterclass in balance and complexity. Dinner was at Wild Common with a tasting menu featuring dishes of serious skill that do not take themselves too seriously — the first course was a hearty, umami steamed bun full of lobster and Japanese curry, made for fingers and joy. Meanwhile, the restaurant’s entrance is awe-inspiring, down a long, lofty hall of old bones and quiet grace — a metaphor for the city itself.