From: scott [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, September 02, 2008 8:56 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: [gatornews] [SUN]: Downtown Gainesville bar scene’s new vibe I get your emails to keep up with the gators, and this one is interesting because my fellow gator friends in our late 30's have been devastated by the departure of joes.. we are looking for a good place to hear live music get looped of course and have a blast.. all the bars across from the stadium are too crowded playing techno crap and just not our scene anymore.. we have even thought about putting up a tent at the delt house (our old fraternity) and hiring our own band.. don’t know how far we'll get with that.. if you have any suggestions it would be greatly appreciated as we get to only few games a year and try to make the most of it.. Thanks Scott Schopke Go Gators and beat the shit out of miami.. ( I was there in 03.. it still sucks) From: Shane <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Ford Sent: Tuesday, September 02, 2008 9:50 AM To: GatorNEWS <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subject: [gatornews] [SUN]: Downtown Gainesville bar scene’s new vibe Downtown bar scene’s new vibe By Anthony Clark <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Gainesville Sun business editor http://www.gatorsports.com/article/20080901/NEWS/809029962/0/gatorsfootball Published: Monday, September 1, 2008 at 6:01 a.m. Last Modified: Tuesday, September 2, 2008 at 1:41 a.m. On a hot sunny day in early August, the owners of new downtown bars Lux and Spank were hammering away at renovations to prepare for openings by the end of the month, while Bishop Tavern and Lounge and the nearby Stubbies & Steins bar and restaurant held openings. With the fall season upon us, activity is heating up for a downtown Gainesville bar scene that has seen a slew of activity in recent months as owners try to get in on what they hope is a downtown renaissance with new condos opening and a hotel under construction. Restaurants are also getting in on the act with expanded liquor offerings and nightclub amenities. Some of the new offerings cater to a crowd that is older than the hordes of college students who descend on the area at night on weekends. Sharab Lounge opened on South Main Street in April as an upscale nightclub and tapas lounge. Bar manager Julian Miller said the two-story nightclub is filling a niche by offering top-shelf alcohol served in glassware and many different flavors of adult fruit drinks like mojitos. Miller said the crowd tends to be late 20s and early 30s. Having worked in other bars where fights would break out regularly, he said they have priced out the riffraff. “It’s not the younger crowd that just comes out and gets absolutely plastered and pukes in the corner,” he said. The two-story club offers live music or DJs, an outside hookah lounge with flavored tobacco and a limited tapas menu with plans to offer full lunch and dinner menus in a couple of months. Miller would not say how much the owner invested, but said the former loft apartment was completely renovated. Plans for the club began two years ago, before condo projects were announced, “but we realized downtown was developing,” Miller said. “It’s a social atmosphere. It’s just something that everybody is trying to capitalize on.” On West University Avenue, owner Steve Nichtberger is opening Lux in the space previously occupied by his Flashback’s Recycled Fashions before he moved it last year. He stopped short of saying his two-story club will be upscale, but said it would be a nice place for those more mature than the typical college crowd. The kind of place people could go on a date and be able to talk over the music. “I’ve heard a lot of people say there’s no bars for someone who works for a living, who wants to go out and have a nice drink and get good service,” he said. Two blocks south of University, Alex Davidowski bought into Shooting Star Japanese Grill & Sushi three months ago to add a nightclub element to the restaurant, adding a full bar, mood lighting and redoing the stereo inside and out, with DJs on an outside patio. He said his goal is for the bar to make at least as much money as the restaurant. He speculated that all the downtown bar activity is a result of the bad economy. “Everybody needs to drink in order to forget their problems,” he said. Whatever the reason, he said more activity will be good for all of downtown. The area already gets a good amount of foot traffic most evenings, and new condos such as The Palms, across the street, will create more traffic for daytime lunch and shopping destinations. “It’ll just create more and more of a vibrant downtown, which I think everybody really wants,” Davidowski said. “It’s more fun for people to come down here. It’s better for the people that live and own businesses down here if there’s just life happening.” Emiliano’s Café also added a full liquor lineup in February, according to owner Diego Ibanez. While the Shooting Star restaurant added a bar, Stubbie Shirt Pub on West University Avenue added a restaurant in the space next door. Berkeley Hoflund and her father, Gar, opened the Stubbies & Steins German restaurant last month next to their 5-year-old pub in the space that last housed the Bowls cereal restaurant. Berkeley Hoflund said all the downtown activity shows how much people want a local option. “I think people are starting to value what local means, instead of a tasteless corporation in other parts of town,” she said. “There is a lot of excitement.” At the nearby corner of University and Main Street, Bishop Tavern and Bishop Lounge opened in the former Bar One location after putting in $250,000 in renovations. David Marshlack of St. Petersburg said he owns 15 bars in Florida, South Carolina and North Carolina and opened Bishop Tavern and Bishop Lounge in Gainesville with his son, Dean, who attended the University of Florida a couple years ago and liked the market. He described Bishop Tavern as a laid-back, college-style bar. On busy nights, the adjacent lounge will open as more of a nightclub, he said. A couple of doors south on Main Street, the old Rehab and the Whiskey Room are under renovation, according to other downtown owners. The properties’ owner could not be reached for comment. David Robinson is also opening a more college-oriented bar, Spank, in the old Side Bar next to his 2nd Street Speakeasy on Southwest 2nd Street. He said he is going for a West Coast, 1970s retro feel. “A lot of bars are going high end and this is going to be just more on the fun side and not so pretentious,” he said while doing renovations. Robinson said all the recent changes are nothing new to downtown. A lot of bars go under and close when their leases are up, then get filled with new businesses. “Every summer you see a couple of new bars coming to town.” Anthony Clark can be reached at [EMAIL PROTECTED] --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ GATORS: ONE VOICE ON SATURDAY - NO VOICE ON SUNDAY! 1996 National Football Champions | 2006 National Basketball Champions 2006 National Football Champions | 2007 National Basketball Champions Three Heisman Trophy winners: Steve Spurrier (1966), Danny Wuerffel (1996), Tim Tebow (2007) - Visit our website at www.gatornet.us -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
