Popination Communication
a series of unhinged personal essays disguised as pub reviews. Today: Union Lodge no.1.
Man, I love walking around in the city at night.
Now, before you New Yorkers or Los Angelenos or even my brethren from Chicago start making fun of me for calling Denver a city, just work with me here. Or, like, walk with me.
Since I grew up and also stayed up in Boulder for most of my life, walking around in a more urban environment has a particular novelty for me, even now after having worked downtown for so many years. Especially if I happen to be walking around at night, the way the lights twinkle up the surfaces of the skyscrapers, all the artistic signs for all the bars and clubs, all of it just makes ‘You Belong to the City’ (by Glenn Frey, natch) play in my head and elevates my mood.
Last week I was doing just this: elatedly walking around downtown trying to find this posh cocktail bar I’d found for Popinating. It was apparently only like a 3 minute walk from the Clocktower where I’d had rehearsal for an upcoming play competition, but the weird wandering journey the map robot sent me on to find this place, made the urban wander a bit longer than was necessary. But I didn’t mind at all. Lately, I’m long abed by the time 9pm rolls around, and so this post-theatrical bar adventure really made me feel young again.
By the time I ignored the map robot for long enough that I found the place myself, my lower back was reminding me just how much I am *not* young again, and so I was relieved to pony up to a cushy bar stool and peruse an artistically art deco, pre-Prohibition style cocktail menu and choose a boozy treat.
We’re No.1! We’re No.1!
This place was a little jewel of a bar nestled in between a new Indian restaurant and some construction. All the construction on this block may be why the robot had such trouble leading me here, but it did make me wonder, too: how many little painfully cool holes in the wall are there around this area of downtown, that I’ve never heard of, even though they’ve apparently been around for 10 years?
There have been many that have surprised me in this way: Pair a Dice was one that was more recent, and then there was that other one, that Spouse suggested to me just based on the pub sign—what was it called again? Ehhhh I can’t find it and I have no idea what it was called…maybe I’ll do a longer search on the map and see if I recognize any names, but there is no research allowed in Popinations, remember?
The vibe of Union Lodge No.1 is…I was going to say ‘speakeasy’ but the secretive, buried-in-a-basement kind of thing isn’t this place at all. It’s got a sort of Victorian window signage thing on and it does indeed have more of a ye olde worlde London than a Denver flavor to it. And it’s just a cocktail bar, so no food to be found inside. I guess we can safely call it a pre-Prohibition aesthetic? We’ll go with that.
Once I chose my cocktail, the hipster-mustached, bow-tie-and-waistcoated bartender with the pleasant lisp to his voice took his time to artisan it together, igniting the twist garnish for extra flavor. And when it was complete, he slid the glass a foot along the bar for me to catch, like I was a cowboy at a saloon in days of old.
Peychaud’s Bitters? I hardly know hers…
Yes, that really does say $19 for a Sazerac. Yes, I did drink one. And actually the first cocktail I had before said Sazerac was a signature unique concoction of some combination of whiskey and bitters and like, Amaro, I think? something bitter…delicious, though. I forget what it was called. But it was $21. Now, to me, that’s an expensive cocktail, but I do recognize that in a more cosmopolitan metropolis, that’s chump change. I don’t care. I’m still giddy that I can wander my way into a teeny little exposed-brick-lined posh corner of downtown and get a bow-tied hipster to flourish a fancy whiskey confection into a pricey little glass for me. Is it a simple pleasure? I think so—I don’t see why expensive pleasures can’t be simple.
I had a lovely time here at Union Lodge No.1, but is it the kind of place I want to come back to? I’m not sure. As beautiful as the hipster mixologist and the devastatingly face-pierced young manager were, and as pretty as the aesthetic surroundings were, I’m not sure warm and friendly and welcoming are adjectives I’d add to that description. But hey, I have two more rehearsals scheduled throughout February at the Clocktower, so I guess we shall see…
