At 4:30 in the afternoon, neither Cynthia Brothers nor Martin Tran, seated on the brown vinyl banquette in the back, feels quite ready for mixed drinks. Tran, a filmmaker and former co-director of the Seattle Asian American Film Festival, sips from a glass of water. Brothers, the originator of the popular “Vanishing Seattle” hashtag and social media account that chronicles Seattle’s soon-to-be-lost or longtime institutions, orders a Kirin beer.

“I love it here,” Tran says. “It’s like our Cheers. Every time you come in, you know everyone.”

Bush Garden is many things: a beloved, decades-old neighborhood watering hole, a (former) tatami-matted Japanese restaurant, a longtime meeting place for activists fighting the neighborhood’s gentrification and, famously, the birthplace of Seattle karaoke.

For Brothers and Tran, it’s also the birthplace of their new project: A seven-part Vanishing Seattle documentary film series made in tandem with local filmmakers.