A GLITTERY RETRO-STYLE TIKI BAR SWINGS INTO LAS VEGAS
Just months after putting up shipwreck walls and video screen portholes, legendary tiki bar designer Ben Bassham — better known in tiki circles as “Bamboo Ben” — is back in Las Vegas, this time creating huts for a new tiki bar near Fremont Street. Glitter Gulch Tiki, which comes from the Nacho Daddy team, introduces a new style of tiki bar to Las Vegas, one with a dance floor, tropical cocktails, and blowfish lights.
At Glitter Gulch Tiki, which opens at 113 4th Street in Downtown Las Vegas on Friday, July 12, Bamboo Ben has created custom straw-thatched booths, bamboo-paneled bar tops, and totem-style statues. The bar’s space used to be occupied by Nacho Daddy, which relocated just north to 121 North 4th Street while its team ventures into the tropical with Glitter Gulch Tiki. The name “Glitter Gulch” has been absent from downtown Las Vegas since the Topless Girls of Glitter Gulch club closed in 2016. Glitter Gulch, the decades-old nickname for the sparkly stretch of downtown, earns its way into the tiki bar with elements of neon in the ceiling and glitter in the tables.
In 2023, Bamboo Ben worked with Stray Pirate to debut the dog-themed pirate bar in the Las Vegas Arts District. In addition to a stellar drinks menu, the bar features experiential design elements making the downtown bar feel like a sunken pirate ship. Glitter Gulch Tiki’s interior will take a similarly immersive approach: the bar will be dark and moody, with a row of huts at the rear crafted by Ben and his son, Blake Basshem. Other seating is furnished with leather and glitter, or flanked by carved wooden archways. The bar is performance-ready with a dance floor and stage; a nearby art window depicts aspects of Las Vegas’s history.
In addition to the classic tiki drinks, signature offerings include the Old Jamaican with rum, coconut liqueur, supasawa sour, bitters, and coconut flakes with a flamed lime peel. The What Happens in Vegas is a take on a daiquiri with lychee puree and dry ice. A light food menu has dishes like coconut shrimp, lumpia, spicy tuna tacos, Dole Whip desserts, and — as one would hope from the Nacho Daddy team — poke nachos with avocado wasabi and mango pico on crispy wonton chips.
Glitter Gulch Tiki evokes a Vegas trend that is both modern and part of the city’s history. Tiki bars got their start in Las Vegas in 1960, when Aku Aku opened at the Stardust Resort and Casino. One of Aku Aku’s giant carved Moai-style heads is now located at Sunset Park. Other Vegas favorites included the divey Frankie’s Tiki Room, the Italian restaurant backyard, Tiki di Amore, the tiki-meets-punk rock bar the Red Dwarf, and the twisted adult Disneyland spectacle, the Golden Tiki. While conversations continue to be had about how the kitschy bar theme is built on the backs of commodified Polynesian culture, some bartenders are exploring ways to celebrate all things tropical without the thorny appropriation of cultural aesthetics.
Glitter Gulch Tiki will be open from 5 p.m. until late Monday through Sunday starting on Friday.
2024-07-11T17:36:07Z dg43tfdfdgfd