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Bad Luck bar is where upscale, imaginative cocktails made with rare and unusual liquors cross over with an intimate and somewhat malevolent setting. Finding this speakeasy is all part of the allure, when inside, the aesthetics and mouth watering vices make it absolutely worth it.
OUR ARTICLE
BY: Ryan Kirk Contributing writerOne of the finest questions you can ask a man of wealth and fortune is not what he did right to earn his treasure but what his best mistake was. Sometimes, it’s our failures, our perceived catastrophic malfunctions, that lead to our biggest successes. When we finally understand that some of our best luck can turn bad and some of our worst luck can turn good — and that the line between the two is not a line at all — that is when we are ready to visit Bad Luck Bar.
Think of Bad Luck Bar like a quest, and you’re a lone ranger on this journey. You’re searching for something, maybe purpose in the form of a nightly pleasure. Your guide is our CYTIES map, and it’s leading you down an alley that looks like it has no business being anything more than concrete between buildings. But our map will only get you close, and it’s up to you to uncover the rest.
Clue #1: Enter through the snake.
While staggering down a dark alley in Detroit in search of a snake might not sound like a choice idea, believe us, it’s worth it. Sometimes, you have to encounter a few serpents before finding a hidden treasure — just ask Indy. Here, behind a door with a snake painted on it, is Detroit’s best luck in its truest form: Bad Luck Bar.
Clue #2: The entrance is not what it seems.
When inside, find a heavy curtain. Think Twin Peaks and do your best Agent Cooper. Cross the dark threshold where time is replaced by imaginative cocktails and rare liquors. It’s here that you’ll enter Bad Luck’s intimate 30-person bar. The speakeasy is decked out in wicked décor, with hexagonal lights hanging over matching tables, geometric inlaid-wood walls, and a quartz bar.
Clue #3: Give in to the light.
After you’ve walked through the curtain, the bar is positioned dead in front of you. The electric glow of the lighting will possess your eyes and captivate your soul. You’ll have no choice but to give in to its allure. Like a ghost, you’ll walk in a trance towards the light and the vast array of liquid riches.
Search for a bar menu and open it up with caution. It’s here where the night takes a malevolent turn. The 13-drink menu is inspired by Tarot cards. Each card has a different cocktail, and one of them will surely decide the fate of your evening.
Bad Luck Bar is known for having some of the rarest liquors in the world. For example, a $200 vice called The Admiral, a Vintage 1953 flagon of British Royal Navy rum. A piece of the past survived only by those old enough for social security.
Our CYTIES recommendation is ENVY. With French Absinthe, Hendrick’s gin, Genepy, cucumber spirulina syrup, fresh lime juice, and black pepper tincture, it’ll spark jealousy from every soul in the room.
Final Clue: Speak easy, friendo.
Giving in to something other than the ego creates a deeper understanding that what shall be will be. This isn’t a black-and-white world, and the illusion of “negative” usually changes into something positive. We need both and have little real control of either.
Bad Luck Bar is a reminder of this ancient knowledge. If your adventure was a success, smile to yourself, secure in the knowledge that you now know the way in, and that you can always come back when a fix is needed. Keep quiet, though, this cocktail galaxy is down an alleyway for a reason — it was created to be a solo journey for the lone traveler.
As they say, “All that you see is not all that is. This is something different. This is Bad Luck Bar.”
