If Quinn’s were a garment, it would be the white shirt: essential and timeless, a wardrobe staple—suitable for morning and night, for the office or for your wedding.
By Eleni Nikoloulia
Because it simply isn’t just another bar in a city with thousands. It feels as if it’s always been here; it honours the classics; it loves wood, art, and the city itself. And, in the end, how (seemingly) simple is it to make a bar timeless even when it’s brand-new?
You put in a heavy, wooden bar—solid, not hollow. You place classic cocktails at the centre of your menu. You keep the mosaic floor because you love this city that much. And you add art—huge art, stretching almost the length of that wonderful bar, as if you were drinking in a museum. Finally, you bolt the stools to the floor to keep guests grounded—an excuse not to leave, so they can say: “I wanted to go, but I was bolted to the floor.” You finish with sailor blue tones and leather sofas.
That’s how Ilias Marinakis conceived it—one of the most discreet yet always-beloved bartenders on the Greek scene. He began at Bar Guru Bar, grew at Baba au Rum, excelled at 42, and, though he passed through various other bars in the city, he spent years combing streets, haunts and properties until he found his very own refuge—one he now shares generously with us.
I don’t know that I need to go on. Quinn’s is Athens’ new Garden of Earthly Delights. It’s as if Ilias knew this when he chose the eponymous Hieronymus Bosch painting as the bar’s signature element. As if he knew that this city has everything—everything except a vast wooden bar under low lighting, with sexy music, with “the coldest Martinis in Greece” (as I’ve long said of his Dry Martinis), with a Zombie—a real beast in the glass—plenty (for a bar) of sparkling wine options, and a textbook-chilled Guinness.
Now we have all of the above. In a sizeable space, off the strip, with a comfortable outdoor area, with coffee and, soon, food by Periklis Koskinas (Cookoovaya). See you there.
Meandrou 7, Ilisia.