Husband wants an arcade, I want a tiki bar, we both want a finished basement. So this project is happening.

In October 2018, I got to experience two amazing tiki bars in one week: Frankie’s Tiki Room in downtown Las Vegas, and Three Dots and a Dash in Chicago. Frankie’s is purely kitsch, kinda smoky and very divey — right up our alley. Three Dots is more “refined” but still very tiki, and their Trader Vic’s Mai Tai costs $5 more than the ones at Frankie’s. While very different, both tiki bars give you that same feeling walking in… loud surf or 50’s-60’s lounge music, low lighting, super relaxed vibe, colorful accents, and of course tikis and nautica everywhere. I need this atmosphere in my life.

Then there’s the arcade, theater/lounge, and aquariums… more to come.

Our basement is long, narrow, and L-shaped. This makes things kind of tricky, especially when the furnace and water heater are placed in the most obstructive place possible. Ultimately our layout will deviate drastically from the original plan, but we know our absolute must-haves and we’re going to figure it out!

Here’s a fabulously inaccurate sketch.

Here’s a more realistic sketch that is also wrong, but whatever. Brainstorming.