Enchanted Reef Bar in UK

We moved house about 1 1/2 years ago into a period style Ranch house which was a lot of work to get back to a 1960's look, One of the many attractions of the house was an almost full size basement which is fairly rare here in the UK, Until recently it has been a dumping room for junk form the move etc, It has now been emptied and is ready for the return of our Home bar we have had in our old House, Our old one was in use for about 20 yeears and took up our whole lounge and was named The Enchanted Reef, It will have the same name of course but Now it is Enchanted Reef 2!, My first job was to sort out Lighting for the ceiling, It had some old Fluorescant striplights and a textured plaster ceiling, So this all had to go,I put small Batten strips up and we run a lot of cable along them for our many lights to go up, Then with the help of a friend we have just put some ply sheets up to cover this and pull the cables through, Next stage will be Lauhala matting!, Hope fully more updates as progress is being made, The Bar in the picture is going to be recovered in Bamboo/Rattan but there as a mockup! (/uploads/434/62a600ee02ca7.jpg)

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 08:12:38 ]

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 08:13:27 ]

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 08:14:07 ]

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 08:14:51 ]

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 08:16:06 ]

Looking forward to seeing progress pics.

Thanks, Here are a couple of pics of our old bar/Lounge!

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-12 14:06:00 ]

great job! looks like a nice tiki bar ya got there.

Can you buy Havana club rum where you are?

Looks great. Can't wait for updates.

Wow! That's a lot of great space you have to work with! One of the fun things about working with a blank slate like that is how the space itself influences the final aesthetic. Of course, to get there is a lot of work and sweat equity which isn't always fun, but you've been through this before and I can't wait to see your final vision made real.

Hi Skip Yes Havana Club freely available, Even our supermarkets keep the popular ones

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-06-13 10:02:07 ]

Damn that would make this a great bar in my book. Have you had a Cuban Ginger, love that drink.

Always wanted to get a bottle of 25 year Havana Club but the guy who used to bring Havana Club back on his company plane for me passed away.

You had to order it and pick it up where he got booze as it was costly and they did not stock it $225.00?

Should start trading lights for booze.

Cuban Ginger

60 ml Havana Club Especial

20 ml Apple liqueur (Berentzen Apple liqueur)

120 ml Ginger Ale

Many Ice cubes

[ Edited by tikiskip on 2022-06-14 05:49:03 ]

Hey that drink sounds good, I am willing to trade but the shipping to and from the US to UK is ridiculous nowadays

Looks like a good place to party.

Progress is being made, All the ply is up on the ceiling, covering the cables and ugly white stippling, Starting to take shape

That made a great change. :-) Keep that momentum going.

Thanks, I have been trial fitting some of our lights in place to get ideas for best placement, Once this is decided the Lauhala matting wil go up(Last time i used a contact adhesive and a few staples, About 20 years ago), Any better ideas out there now?(

After a long Covid Hiatus, we are back on track, here a few more pics

Looks great!

NOW if you want while you can the Kahiki put starfish as a base for the lights on the ceiling as in the wire for the light went through the middle of the starfish on each hanging light.

Do not breath in starfish drill dust that stuff can be bad for you.

It looked really cool.

Good luck.

See like this I did a few in my tiki bar.

Great idea Skip, I have some small round sections of Cork from old fishing nets i shall be using to cover some of my light cable ends, I Will post when done

This looking great so far. Nice work

You going to stain that matting? It looks so fresh.

Yes that will be done soon

"You going to stain that matting? It looks so fresh."

That will be a real pain to do that matting gets real drippy and the stain runs too. You gonna have a sore neck after that one.

Might want to stain some of that matting on the ground and see if that is a thing you really want to do.

Good luck.

A very good point and all the matting is now up on the ceiling!, Might try a few scraps and if okay i will probably do the walls as that stuff is from a different place and new, The ceiling stuff is from OA and was used in our old house, I mangaed to get it down and reuse it), The stuff on the walls is narrow 4' wide from Franks Cane and Rush

Finally got most of our lights fitted up and wired, Still a few more to go and a bit of adjusting here and there! All on a smart AP, so no more long extension cords spending ages turning them on and off [](Uploading P1370888.JPG…)

Looks stellar!

Looking good. GROG like.

More progress made recently, We boxed in two areas that had pillars on them, One for a shadow box type frame and the TV, The 2nd for 2 3D pictures and a porthole, Stained and burned the wood cladding(this was leftover offcuts from our lounge ceiling!) I found an old Picture and used the frame which was cut down to fit over the TV and mounted to more cladding so that if i need access to the back of TV i can lift it off, The picture in the frame has been made slideable so when not in use you cant see the TV, just a picture, Next project will be covering this area in Tapa Cloth, so still some finishing off to do also i will probaly cut some rough edges on the cladding(not sure on that yet though) P1370900

Lookin good.

Very imaginative idea for the TV! Well done! Just looking at your amazingly decorated previous bar, you must have an incredible amount of stuff packed away in boxes at the moment?

Yes so much stuff packed away, has been sat in boxes for about 2 years,cant wait to get them all out again

Solid work!!!

Latest pics of recent work, Tapa cloth was put around the TV area, with the old picture frame installed around the TV, Cut up a ply insert for the centre of the TV and mounted some more Tapa on this(it slides out from the top for TV viewing), Did similar above with an old Bamboo frame and made a sunken shadow box and used some LED Tape lights on the edge, the frame just lifts off from the front to place stuff in there(just put a couple of bits temporarliy to see what it looks like, then on finishing the cupboards, I worked out my Monekyman LP frames fit over the cupboard doors so screwed them on from behind to cover them

[ Edited by TIKIWAGON on 2022-10-22 01:02:24 ]

That's coming along nicely.

I’m digging this entire build! Curious to see more photos of the porthole as well. Looks very cool from what I can see.

Looking good.

It looks like you did a test on Shellacking the Tapa and maybe the Shellac soaked in and did not look so good.

Just a guess, but if you coat all of the tapa with Elmers's glue just the top part you want to Shellac, then let that dry, then paint with the shellac it might be more what you are looking for.

The glue stops the shellac from soaking into the Tapa and it looks much better that way, it also helps to protect the tapa too.

Hey Skip thanks for the advice i will try that, Here is the finished porthole(will have to get some better pictures)

Latest Update,just doing the hall and stairs entrance area,( Fitting Tapa cloth to the ceiling was a challenge to say the least), Got on really well we used a nice roll of Matting from OA on the stair ceiling the put a Port and Straboard light on the entrance to the main bar and put up another homemade shelf (using old dried up,yucca leaves from the garden as the thatched top)in the hall

That huge tapa is (and looks!) amazing! Where did you score that?

It was from a swapmeet in California

Tha bar is now mocked up ready to take apart for flooring then finishing off and staining to age the bamboo etc, We had to extend it about 12" in the middle and fix a wall piece on left side, Next we put battens up for the glass shelves that will hold some of our Tiki Mugs

We assembled most of the room divider last week but have taken it apart again so i can lay the floor, at least it is easy now that all the hard work of getting bent and tapered bamboo poles to look straight!, It will have 9 Vintage Chinese Jade tiles put in the middle holes once it is all back together, We had to to put some battens on the floor and ceiling to slide the large poles on for strength as otherwise it is only held up on one wall, these will be covered by bamboo cut in half to cap them, Also got a small drop in sink fitted into tho the back corner of the bar, We dont have a water supply or waste so it will have a small 12 volt pump in a plastic container underneath and another one for dirty water, Then cut some bamboo for a cap on the front edge of the bar

It's looking great. Where did you get the matting from if you don't mind me asking? It's just seems expensive for a 2m x 2m piece from little grass shack. Brandon Thatchers seems the same?

I got some of the matting from the States quite awhile ago from Oceanic Arts before they shut and some from Frank's cane and rush, A lot was in our old bar in our previous house which i managed to save, It's almost impossible get here in the UK

Enchanted Reef Bar in UK Not so much done recently but finally got the floor down, We put some wood packers in the ends of the Bamboo poles and filled with expanding foam, then trimmed off so they can sit on the bar top to hold the thatched roofing, Laminated the bar top with some black formica(tried several 50's patterns and bright colours but black seemed to look best,and was very cheap!), Also finally painted the window frames which were a bright white which won't work in a Tiki bar

Finally got our lovely Rattan set in place and the room divider set up with Jade tiles mocked up ready for rope fixing, Bar is back in place with thatching done, Most of the construction work is done at last(Apart from a suitable cover for the horrible white radiator) so at last we can start putting up pictures etc and filling the space

I love it! It really looks great!

Just realized i hadn't posted the progress for a long time, A lot more has been done, not far off finishing now! Radiator covers made, Mugs are starting to be unpacked(forgot how many we had!!) And finally starting to rope the Jade tiles properly! [](Uploading P1390161.JPG…)

Quite the mug collection. And an even more awesome tile collection! Looks great.

That looks great.