Mystery Bar – now with even more Pretentious Wank™!

We’re not cock(tail)teases, real­ly. We do want to let you in on all the secrets, but first of all we want to give you the chance to prove that you’re hip­per and groovi­er than every­one else by iden­ti­fy­ing the bar in ques­tion.

In the end, it was­n’t long before one of the many anons picked the last mys­tery bar as Duke Carvel­l’s Swan Lane Empo­ri­um, run by the Bresolin boys and delec­table in every way. But who’s going to be the first to iden­ti­fy this place?

As we flies were smug­ly alight­ing at the bar, we noticed that not much had vis­i­bly changed since our last vis­its. But changes are indeed afoot: it’s been tak­en over by anoth­er of Welling­ton’s most notable hospo fam­i­lies, and appar­ent­ly a full ren­o­va­tion is on the way to go with the new name. As it is, it’s some­what in lim­bo, so it might be worth wait­ing a lit­tle while for them to start mak­ing their mark and reviv­i­fy­ing its for­tunes.

While prov­ing our­selves hip­per-than-thou by engag­ing in some ban­ter about celebri­ties we know (“Have you heard what Dami­an’s been get­ting up to?” “Ooh, do tell!”) we asked for the cock­tail list. How­ev­er, that par­tic­u­lar pub­li­ca­tion appears to be out of date, since they’re all from the pre­vi­ous incar­na­tion and no-one knows how to make them. Although the new bar man­ag­er is a chef and is plan­ning all sorts of mol­e­c­u­lar mixol­o­gy malarkey for the upcom­ing 42 Below champs, he had­n’t worked behind a bar for a while and was more than a lit­tle unsure. Nev­er­the­less, a Mar­ti­ni made with more apolo­gies than olives was more than drink­able (as evinced by the empti­ness of the glass in our pho­to), and both the Jamaican Mule and an apple-crum­ble-inspired con­coc­tion were lapped up by the sweet­er-mandibled flies amongst us.

The music selec­tion, which on a qui­et night veered between loud elec­tro and loud­er house, might not be to every­one’s taste. Seri­ous­ly, dar­lings, who lis­tens to any­thing but alt-prog-swamp-coun­try these days? But we’re expect­ing great things from the new own­ers’ mag­ic touch (no pres­sure, boys!). Where, oh where, can we have been? (No, seri­ous­ly, we’d like to know because we can’t remem­ber a thing).