This bar wears a heavy coat of decadence, wrapping you in copper, dark mahogany and plush velvet across its three floors.
It conjures an atmosphere that casts you back to the 1800s and although lumbered with a name that many people struggle to remember, Peruke and Periwig (it was once a wig-makers), the 18-month-old pub on Dawson Street in Dublin is doing just great.
Flavour is everything here: the bar staff start their week chopping plums and laying them out under a blanket of sugar to make a homemade syrup they call shrub.
After two days of preparation, it forms the heart of their cocktails. They repeat the process with blackcurrants, mango and grape before moving on to whipping up a rich Guinness syrup. They could easily buy all this readymade but the labour somehow suits them, although they say they can’t think of any other pub that goes to the trouble.
There’s a full bar on offer here, plus a great whiskey menu, but it’s the cocktails – and service – that define the place. Glance through the menu and the flavours pull you in: elderflower, frangelico, chilli sugar, rose water, pomegranate, lychee, sea salt and all the spirits that support them. Cocktails are a serious business and the staff are well-trained.
Peruke and Periwig is owned by the group behind the Liquor Rooms, Bison Bar and the Workman’s Club. They’ve set the bar high but have carved a niche. Dave McConvey tells me his staff are career bar staff and I can see it. In my two visits I’m welcomed and coached, encouraged and entertained.
I watch them work, pouring drinks, chatting and see people delighted with their place in the world. It makes me want to be a local.
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