This Bishop Arts District travel guide features things to do in Bishop Arts District and places to sip, shop, and stroll in Dallas’ local-beloved neighborhood. 

In my early twenties, I talked about Bishop Arts District like it was mine—my space to go, to breathe, to free myself from the matrix of Mondays. Dallas demanded a workhorse. Sales and developer jobs headlined LinkedIn listings, and I was a new graduate, a Texas-made 5ft 4in gear in DFW’s churn of tech jobs, clogging North Central Expressway.

Bishop Arts District didn’t subscribe to Dallas’ go, go, go mentality. Here lay a little Oak Cliff neighborhood selling daytime desserts, open books, and evening sips of wine. Post work, on sunny days, Bishop Arts District became a sound chamber for patio conversations, earnest gift shoppers thinking (out loud) in homes-turned-boutiques, and the contented sighs that follow forkfuls of farm-fresh dinners.

I loved the area the first time I walked through it and even more the next. Soon, Bishop Arts District was one of my designated Dallas comfort spots.

Brief History Of Bishop Arts District

In the early 20th century, Bishop Arts District was a hop-off stop in Dallas’ bustling network of streetcars. A few decades later, when buses burst into popularity and shopping malls asserted themselves as hangouts, Bishop Arts District’s thread of warehouses became people-less shadows [source].

In the 1980s, Jim Lake Sr, a developer, purchased the abandoned, nail-boarded properties, and tenants took on lower rents to draft their business ideas. Tired buildings awoke from their slumbers, transforming North Oak Cliff into a walkable mixed-used space rebranded as Bishop Arts District.

People came in—first locals, then tourists, then rich locals and tourists. Rent and home prices shot up, and much of the Latino history that made Oak Cliff – that backboned Dallas – was erased.

In recent years, Hispanic-owned businesses have been making a comeback in Bishop Arts District. Luis Mentiiras took a break from film school to craft elotes and other antojitos on N Tyler Street [source]. Jamie Uribe and T.J. Gonzales founded The Trove, a mezcaleria pumping Latin pop until 2 AM. Marco Cavazos opened a beautiful bookshop that is a beacon for poets. Jessica Griffin’s flea market pop-ups blossomed into MoonFire, a Latina-owned boutique [source].

9 Things To Do In Bishop Arts District In One Day

Under sleek slants of morning light, people appear in Bishop Arts District just long enough to find a cafe. They flag down the scent of espressos (and sugar-shined breakfasts, if served) and disappear around a corner.

Grab A Coffee

Bishop Arts District coffee shops, part of the first little wave of establishments that open in the neighborhood (the second wave rolls in at 11 AM, the third at noon, and the fourth past 5 PM), fully jolt into action at 8 AM.

Wayward Coffee Co’s espressos are deliciously dialed in. Hola Cafe’s Horchata Lattes draw lines that stretch past its door and onto the sidewalk. The Salty’s buzzy breakfast duo is a bouncy, brioche-based Churro Star donut and a cutting cold brew. And Tribal All Day Cafe’s silky Rosemary Vanilla Lattes leave their imprint alongside fruit-sweet, vacation-style smoothie bowls.

Read Next: 5 Best Coffee Shops In Bishop Arts District

See The Street Art

Your post-coffee amble will take you along the neighborhood’s brick-paved pathways and uneven sidewalks, past walls that reveal Bishop Arts District’s history and character. An old favorite resides within a teal-awninged alley (near Coco Fire & Ice’s glitzy Besos Papi sign): a charming scene of neighbors through windows, a couple mingling outside a diner, and a waiter holding a steaming hot drink.

On the corner of W Seventh St and N Madison Ave, across from a plot perpetually under construction, is Love Equation. The steps, once stained yellow, and the railing, once slicked in grime, have now been cleaned up, turning a dust-dense spot into a popular engagement photoshoot location.

Doritos Stands With Tex Moton, an amplify Black voices mural along W Davis St that, will stop you in your tracks. Through bubbles of text spoken by a young girl, teddy bear in her hand, afro reflecting a blurry haze of red-and-blue lights, Tex Moton illustrates a too-real conversation Black children have with their parents.

Go On A Bookstore Crawl

Bishop Arts District bookstores take on the weight of lit fic, poetry, translated contemporaries, and libros en español. A zig-zagging third of a mile is the perfect path for a bookstore crawl. 

Whose Books promotes children’s, middle grade, and young adult books (educator Claudia Vega stocks up on the kinds of diverse tales I wished for in my childhood school libraries). The social impact store hosts storytimes, book club meetups, author events, and poetry nights.

You’ll find more poetry at Poets Oak Cliff, one of the first bookstores I slip into whenever I’m back in town. Here, you’ll find slim volumes produced by small-press publications, experimental fiction designed to impact, and niche armchair travel books.

End your bookstore crawl at The Wild Detectives, where whiskey-wound drinks slide onto a bar counter and beautiful Penguin Classics drop-caps occupy shelves. Almost all titles are face-out at Wild Detectives: new releases, Oprah Book Club selections, and Indie Next List picks. The cabin-like atmosphere with wooden walls, wooden ceilings, wooden tables, and wooden shelves dims into a nighttime entertainment venue where music strums, comedy shows bring laughs, and readers gather to converse about books.

Find A Gift For Someone You Love

Within Bishop Arts District’s sixty independent boutiques and restaurants are a series of gift shops, including: 

• All Good Things: a personal favorite, with fluted tables and boho shelves carrying illustrated cards tucked into seed paper envelopes, self-care-focused planners, candles that smell like figs and acorns, and artist-designed products made with love in the USA. 
• MoonFire: has all the hallmarks of a desert boutique with wands of wild sage, celestial necklaces, and gold-plated polymer clay earrings.
• Talking Out Of Turn: a TikTok popular soundboard for fun and funky notebooks, boss babe mugs, and tie-dye-colored pouches.

Cozify Your Home

If you’re looking for a way to add a personal touch to your space:

• Oasis Plant Shop: a one-story home converted into an indoor jungle. Succulents. Snake plants. Cavallini Papers & Co art posters draped over a ladder. Mushroom-shaped candles. Cacti-textured pots (I took one home on my last visit).
• Spinster Records: if you love music, Spinster gets the vinyl record shop vibes just right. There are plenty of albums by contemporary artists to sift through (note: pricing was a bit more expensive than I expected)
• House Rules: my favorite board game store in Dallas. It’s the place to go if you’re looking for art-forward indie board and card games to add to your game night rotation.
• Mosaic Makers: goods made in Texas by Texans (I love Onderkast Studio’s pastel Dallas maps in particular)

Browse Bishop Bazaar

At Bishop Bazaar, billowing canopies shade woven totes, hand-painted ceramics, and flower-pressed soaps. You’ll pass racks of denim jackets, cropped camis, and flared pants. The air smells like sliced jalapeños and grilled sausages and meaty broths soaked in soy sauce. With coffee or margaritas in their hands, visitors diverge naturally into two shuffling lines, sampling this-or-that.

Bishop Bazaar is an artist alley and a food court. The neighborhood event takes place once a month(ish). Upcoming market dates are listed on Instagram.

Sweeten Your Day

After a long work week, getting dessert in Bishop Arts District makes sense. Picolé’s Brazilian pops are boozy and fruity. Emporium Pies’ The Drunken Nut is truly Southern and sweet: chopped Texas pecans coat a buttery pie. Dude, Sweet Chocolate’s crazy concoctions (golden milk with toasted quinoa and Valrhona Dulcey, porcini mushroom toffees, white chocolate with matcha and candied bread crumbs) keep me coming back (I’ve learned, over the years, to put my faith in Katherine Clapner’s creations). Joy Macarons elevates the two-note sweetness of macarons into a meringue-filled melody.

Enjoy Good Weather At A Patio

On weekends, when the grass is summer green and the afternoon air doesn’t bite, Bishop Arts District’s patios fill up. Chatter churns into a cacophony. People lean back into outdoor chairs. They laugh, vent, gossip, and smile.

Almost every restaurant in Bishop Arts District has a backyard, a side yard, or a front yard space. If they don’t, they do anything—from backing benches into brick alleys to pulling windows up—to create a sense of the outdoors.

So nibble Village Baking Co’s pretzel croissants on a wrap-around porch. Settle into any of Taco Y Vino’s red-legged outdoor tables and split six tacos and a bottle of wine ($45). Or opt for a girl’s night at Paradiso, ordering too-pretty-to-sip-on drinks and single-serve wood-fired pizzas in a courtyard that looks straight out of Vogue: grass buzz-cut trim, boho pendant lights dangling from branches, and pink cushions accompanying pink umbrellas.

Read Next: 12 Best Restaurants In Bishop Arts District

Or Duck Into A Bishop Arts District Bar

If you’re heading to Bishop Arts District on rain-stained evenings, chances are you’re hitting up one of the neighborhood’s bars.

Atlas‘ broody interior is Edgar Allen Poe-inspired: teardrop chandeliers, brocaded walls, and a hidden bookcase entrance that groans as servers scurry in and out. Atlas’ drinks are wormholes that let you enter Ireland, Jamaica, Mexico, and Peru.

For a slice of Miami in Dallas, head to The Trove for Latin pop, gemstone-inspired cocktails, and Drag Brunch Sundays.

Tiny Victories is another bar to note. It’s just 1000 square feet, but its bartenders have razor-sharp mixology skills (and yes, they craft mean mocktails, too). Drinks are nuanced and chill and leave a big impression, much like Dallas’ Bishop Arts District.

Let me know about your Bishop Arts District trip! What were (or are) your favorite things to do in Bishop Arts District? This is by no means a comprehensive list! I always love trying new spots.