Welcome to the Tiki Central 2.0 Beta. Read the announcement
Celebrating classic and modern Polynesian Pop

Tiki Central / Locating Tiki / Lilo Lounge, San Francisco, CA (bar)

Post #43913 by hanford_lemoore on Mon, Jul 21, 2003 11:45 PM

You are viewing a single post. Click here to view the post in context.

Tiki Road Trip gave the Lilo a review that reads like it wasn't a great place to visit. But while Jame's review is spot-on, what it doesn't state (and I didn't expect it to state) was that the Lilo was a damn good bar.

The drinks were great. They needed more standards and classics, but what they did serve were strong and tasty. The bartenders were cool, and on slow nights they would play Exotica if you asked them to (they had several Exotica CDs behind the bar).

The crowd felt didn't feel like it was a meat-market, even though there was a lot of that going on. I don't think anyone entering that bar would ever feel out of place entering it. It was a real casual atmosphere.

When they first opened they served all their drinks in tiki mugs, but they were all quickly stolen on crowded nights. Only the Volcano bowls remained in service until closing (and yes, they lit the volcano and served it burning).

It was connected to a delicious Thai Resturant next door and had great bar food.

The decor of this bar felt home-grown tiki to me rather than a professional setup. There were two big tikis who were obviously styrofoam. There was reed matting on the walls, and a corrogated alumninum overhang on the bar area. The coolest most professional part of the bar was the Thai-style dual ceiling fans that were driven by a crankshaft.

I guess the best part of the Lilo was the fact that while it was not particularly Tiki, it wasn't un-tiki for sure. There was no TV. Otto regularly DJed exotica there, and I even saw King Kukulele play there to a packed house. The editor of Taboo visited for a book-signing. It had everything you need to make a great bar friendly to Tiki fans.

Decor aside, it was a great place, and I'm sad that is closed in 2001(?).

[ Edited by: hanford_lemoore on 2003-07-21 23:46 ]