It's open already. Has been for more than half a year. So the review itself is not sneaky, but the place is a little bit. The sign, with it's single martini glass reminiscent of Swig down the street, suggests an upscale place (disregarding the cartoon of the man on the same sign, all nose, peering over the top of the bar name) as do the rather swanky velvet curtains in the window. Perhaps it's also because it used to be a trendy (not trendy enough, obviously) little glass store and I'm just projecting or remembering or something else psychologically elusive. Still I was surprised to find the dive-like atmosphere when I walked in with my brother last Saturday afternoon. It was early and smelled like stale cigarettes (a smell I'm actually partial to, though a smoky bar is grounds for a quick walk-out -- go figure). The cheap-looking, but fairly varied, bottles of booze behind the counter stood out immediately in the dark room and both the gloom and the booze added to the ambiance.
Small, dingy, filled mostly with a strangely shaped bar that wraps around a column -- intriguing. One pool table if that's what you like, sat in a small mostly open room spitting distance from the bar itself. When we saw that they had something like Bud Light and ZiegenBock on tap, we turned tail, but not before the attentive bartender, a slim young lady, walked over. We asked after the bottle variety of the frothy muse. The usual. So: a couple of Modelos later we were out on the unassuming patio, which, despite it being right in front of the place, had avoided my notice (I'm either losing any perception I once had or the sign and curtains stole the show): a couple of metal tables and benches fenced in catty-corner to the Buckhorn.
The patio afforded an interesting place to relax as a mixture of people walk up and down Presa. Not nearly as many people as St. Mary's or Alamo, but all kinds: tourists (some who come up off the river at Mad Dog's), river rats, and general San Antonionians (its got a ring to it: say it out loud). Between the two of us, John and I saw five people we knew to varying degrees within the hour we were there. A group of (probably) military guys, young and buzzing, asked us where the closest liquor store was (there's two -- Houston and Losoya & Commerce and Presa) and we chatted with a guy we know at the bar as we settled up. Good friendly fun. Definitely worth a peek.
More information: An article from the Express-News and one from their downtown blog (though I wouldn't call it the next Davenport).
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