COCONUTS HOT SPOT – I really didn’t want to go to Apoteka. Not because I knew anything about the venue, but because when a friend invited me out she told me it was on Sukhumvit 11.
What’s not to like about Sukhumvit 11? If you can’t answer this question I probably don’t like you. But in brief: the snarling traffic, the swarthy backpackers, the helplessly uncool nightlife venues thriving off older wannabe lotharios and the desperate local women who love them.
You get my point.
But Apoteka, just eight weeks old, is reason enough to run the gauntlet of smells and sights that await you on this strip of lower Sukhumvit hell. The sign outside – a neon-green medical cross – makes a bold promise of relief, and you’ll feel well served after you’ve settled in.
There’s a concept to Apoteka, but Iron Fairies or Mr. Jones’ Orphanage it is not. And thank god for that. The wrought-iron railing leading up the stairs to the second floor, the curvy seats and the backlit displays of antique vials – lining either end of the bar – clue you into Apoteka’s Victorian influences.
There’s the curious name, of course; it’s Serbo-Croatian for apothecary, which informs the extensive cocktail menu. Here are some antidotes and remedies on offer at the bar: Anaphylactic Shock (dark rum, pineapple, orange juice, and nutmeg), Mr. Hyde (midori, dark rum, triple sec, vodka and lime), and Penicillin (ricard, gin, Cointreau, and lemon). The cocktails are competently made, but could use some tweaking to warrant their quixotic names. Still, at THB230 each – a price inclusive of tax and service charge – you could do much worse.
Just when you think you’ve figured Apoteka out you’ll find there’s a lot more to discover. There’s the opium den – a narrow room off to the side, bathed in red, (open on weekends and to reservations). And there’s a secret space connecting these two areas – an expansive, high-backed leather booth surrounded with boxes of Johnnie Walker Blue (also open to reservation). Sometime later this year you can expect the laboratory-themed second floor to open.
The time I went the crowd was younger and foreign, having fun without annoying others. It was not a pickup joint. With luck it’ll stay that way.
FIND IT:
Apoteka
33/28 Sukhumvit Soi 11
Bangkok, Thailand
Phone: 090 626 7655
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James Yu is a freelance writer and editor. You can follow him on instagram @jamcyu and tumblr.
