A Pop-Up Tiki Bar! The Low Tide Lounge Seattle, WA

Posted by Ray on in Tiki Bars, Tiki Lifestyle
Lowtide Lounge at The Piranha
Lowtide Lounge at The Piranha

You should start a Tiki bar!

If I had a nickel for every time someone said this to me, I would be rich! Okay, well maybe I would have enough to buy a cup of coffee, but I digress.

Yes, starting a Tiki bar is a dream of mine, but it’s not easy and it’s not cheap. You need to find a place that’s in a good location and somewhere you can afford the rent. You also need a license to serve alcohol AND a license to sell it. I haven’t even talked about the money needed for décor.

One idea I thought of was doing a “pop-up” bar. I was down in Los Angeles and they got pop-ups for everything including food, clothing, music, and of course, booze. The idea is to rent a space out for a week, a month, or even a day. I thought a Tiki pop-up bar would be a great idea. Well, great minds think alike. Duffy De Armas made my a dream a reality! He opened the Tiki pop-up bar: the Low Tide Lounge.

Alison, Harvey, Ali and Duffy
Alison, Harvey, Ali and Duffy

Here is his story…

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Home Tiki Bar Spotlight #15 The Fuzzy Smudge Olalla, WA

Posted by Ray on in Home Tiki Bars 1 Comment
Mark and The Fuzzy Smudge
Mark and The Fuzzy Smudge

Remember that old saying “as the crow flies?”

It meant the actual distance between two points via a straight line. The town of Olalla is only 15 miles away from Seattle, but that doesn’t mean it’s close—let alone easy—to get to. The Puget Sound stands between Seattle and Olalla, which means you have two ways of getting there: taking a ferry or driving around and below the Puget Sound. A ferry trip is not cheap, so that means driving is the best way to get there. Why all the fuss about getting to Olalla? Because Debbie and Mark Whitehead live there and down in their basement lies the Fuzzy Smudge…

Going downstairs to The Fuzzy Smudge
Going downstairs to The Fuzzy Smudge
The Fuzzy Smudge bar
The Fuzzy Smudge bar

Here is Debbie and Mark’s story…

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Tiki VIP #10 JoJo Feo (JoJo’s Tiki Hut)

Posted by Ray on in Tiki VIP
JoJo Feo
JoJo Feo

I’m always excited to find cool stuff going on back where I grew up in PA. Outside of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, there isn’t much in between. Sometimes you have to create your own scene and JoJo Feo is doing just that with her own Tiki jewelry business: JoJo’s Tiki Hut! There’s a growing rockabilly and pin-up community happening in central PA and JoJo is adding Tiki into the mix. This is her story…

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The Polynesian Islander Revue At The Mai Kai Fort Lauderdale, FL

Posted by Ray on in Tiki Lifestyle, Tiki Music
Polynesian Islander Revue at The Mai Kai
Polynesian Islander Revue at The Mai Kai

Head on down to the Mai Kai in Fort Lauderdale, FL and for less than $15, you can be entertained by the Polynesian Islander Revue. The show is almost two hours of non-stop music, dancing, fire dancing and more! The coolest thing is you get to learn about Polynesian culture as you enjoy the show, eat, and drink. It doesn’t get much better than this. My buddy Dave Gittleman is a professional photographer and he got a ton of great shots of the show. Here’s a little taste of the action on stage at the Mai Kai!

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Tiki Bar Review #22 The Mai Kai Fort Lauderdale FL

Posted by Ray on in Tiki Bars 4 Comments
Mai Kai sign
Mai Kai sign

I live in Seattle. I booked a flight and flew six hours across the country to go to the Mai Kai. Why? Because when it comes to Tiki bars, the Mai Kai is it! My visit to the Mai Kai lasted five hours and I could have stayed longer. What is so special about the Mai Kai you may ask? Well, let’s start from the beginning…

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Home Tiki Bar #14 Spotlight Toad’s Grog Grotto East Vancouver, BC

Posted by Ray on in Home Tiki Bars

Heather and Terry the owners of Toad's Grog Grotto

I was talking to a friend of mine and he mentioned that he really loves speakeasy bars. The idea of a speakeasy is borrowed from the days of prohibition when alcohol was illegal. People still wanted to party and get their drink on, so hidden bars were built. Some bars were in basements, in underground tunnels, or behind secret doors. Of course, it’s totally legal to drink booze now, but the idea of speakeasy is really cool.

I like to think of Toad’s Grog Grotto as a speakeasy Tiki bar! Heather and Terry Manning live in a townhouse in East Vancouver, BC and you would never think a Tiki bar would be near. But there is a Tiki bar and it’s in Heather and Terry’s garage. As much as Heather and Terry love Tiki, they also love bicycles. They needed to keep their collection of bikes somewhere, so they decided to split the garage in half. When you open the garage door, all you see are bicycles. Hidden behind the bikes is a curtain and behind that curtain lies Toad’s Grog Grotto! This is Heather and Terry’s story…

Toad's Grog Grotto Entrance
Toad’s Grog Grotto Entrance

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Tiki VIP #9 Jonathan M. Chaffin (Horror In Clay)

Posted by Ray on in Tiki VIP
Jonathan M. Chaffin Horror In Clay
Jonathan M. Chaffin Horror In Clay

The gateway into Tiki culture for many people is the Tiki mug. Some mugs are found used at an antique shop or acquired as a souvenir at a Tiki bar. They look cool and collectable. It’s art that you can drink out of! At the beginning, Tiki mugs were just that. Mugs were designed to look like Tiki statues and that’s about it. Fast-forward to present day: Tiki mugs can be designed as pretty much anything. Many different subcultures like rockabilly, punk, hot-rod, or even just a general interest in Mid-Century lead people into loving Tiki. Why not combine those subcultures with Tiki? Luckily someone has! If you go to Frankie’s Tiki Room in Las Vegas, you can drink out of Tiki mug that’s shaped like a slot machine!

One subculture that has been mixed with Tiki is horror. I’ve seen Tiki mugs that are crafted as zombies, skulls, shrunken heads, and even as Frankenstein’s monster. Horror In Clay is the master of the horror-Tiki mug. The mugs they create are so cool and intricate. Jonathan M. Chaffin started Horror In Clay and here is his story…

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Tiki Bar Review #20 Lee’s Hawaiian Islander Lyndhurst, NJ

Posted by Ray on in Tiki Bars

Lee's Hawaiian Islander

Lyndhurst, New Jersey.

It’s a city that’s a 45-minute train ride from downtown Manhattan. It has no claim to fame and I can’t see anyone needing to or wanting to go there—unless you happen to be my buddy Matt who lives there.

I was in Pennsylvania visiting my parents and long story short, I missed my connecting flight that would get me back to Seattle. I asked the man at the flight desk what my options were. He said I could come back the next day and fly out at 5:00 AM (no, I wasn’t doing that!) or I could fly down to Newark right then and fly out from there the next morning at 8:00 (okay, that’s much better). So that’s what I did.

Matt picked me up at the Newark airport and started heading back to his place. “Are you hungry?” Matt asked. “If so, there’s someplace you need to see.”

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