STILLIFE — Restaurant in Montreal

I find it unfortunate that I have to write this review, but I feel obligated to share my experience.

We came here with high hopes. We did arrive early (we were the first people seated), and initially, everything seemed primed for a great night. Friendly staff, interesting cocktails, and a really cool space.

When we walked in, the place was empty. The staff let us know that people generally arrive later in the night (we did come early, around 9PM, but we are out-of-towners), and the bar was recommended to us. The staff let us know that they had a reservation at one table, but could guarantee us seating at another if we stayed the night.

After discussing, we decided to stay the evening at this bar and support the staff who had -- up until this point -- been friendly and generous.

Interestingly enough, as the bar started to get more crowded, the staff let us know that we needed to move tables. This was not an issue for us, as they had let us know ahead of time that we would be guaranteed seating at another table. However, when the time came to move, they informed us that there was nowhere for us to sit, but we were "welcome to stand around the bar".

Ordinarily, this is not something I would take issue with. But the fact that this establishment went out of their way to guarantee us seating, have us stay for 2 hours, ordering drinks and food, only to shoo us away and renege their "guarantee" of a table once the place started getting more crowded, was upsetting. Had they been honest with us from the start and not gone out of their way to try and keep us there when the bar was empty, (and let us know that they couldn't seat us past 11), I would have had no issue.

As someone who has traveled to many cities, I've had the privilege of going out to different bars, clubs, lounges, etc. I am willing to overlook many things, and do not see myself as a "hard reviewer" (most of my ratings are 4-5 stars). One thing that I will not put up with is disrespect and blatant lies. Unfortunately, this was our experience at Stillife.

The only beacon of hope at this place was our initial waiter, Vince. He was cool, considerate, and helpful. This establishment would do well to promote him over their current management.

I would avoid this place (despite its cool decor) and find somewhere more willing to respect their customers.

Needless to say, we won't...

I don't really ever leave reviews but I have to with this bar... This place is trying so hard to be cool that it is HILARIOUS. It would be zero stars if it wasn't so funny to live through. It felt like an SNL parody. We arrived early on a Saturday night after dinner, party of four, no lineup, the door man needed to check via walkie-talkie if there was space inside. He urged us that the bar was full and seating would be impossible, "you have an hour and you can only stand!!!" We walk closer to the door and a second employee rushes out all worried "uhhh I don't think we have space inside" he says to the door man then turns to us and echos the same "1 hour, standing only" rule. We go inside and laugh about how up-tight they were and are greeted by a woman who says "welcome, please remember we're full and no seats are available, so standing only." Once we arrived inside the actual bar, it was totally dead, maybe 12 patrons with 70% of the seats and tables empty. The bartender acted like she'd rather be walking on broken glass than at work and very coldly took our orders. Only three of us ordered cocktails which came to about $100 for tiny, child-size cups. Standing by a mirrored glass door, we bump into a staff member coming out of a room where he proudly announces to us (we never asked) that this was a VIP room where they were serving an "exclusive omakase experience". We decided to take a seat at one of the many empty tables despite their no-fun policy because we knew we weren't planning on staying very long at such an "exclusive, high-end, utterly fabulous" queue the eye roll bar. I kid you not, within a couple minutes one employee alerts another employee who grabs another and tells a fourth to remind us of their no seating rule. Suffice to say, we could not finish our drinks and leave fast enough. This bar is such a joke, you'd think you were walking into a social experiment. Truthfully though, it serves us right for going to any bar in the old port. Avoid...

Disappointing service for such a gem of a place. We loved the whole experience of finding the speakeasy, and then getting to see the cozy place (looks really nice). Unfortunately, the drinks were very disappointing. We started off by ordering 2 shots, which they gave us less than half full. The waiter explained that it’s 1 ounce per shot and the shot glass fits 2 ounces - but every bar that we’ve been in montreal serves full shots in the ‘2 ounce glasses’ that they claimed, which they filled at about 1/4 of the glass. I ordered a gin basil, which had no basil or lemon in it whatsoever, and was missing the whole sweetness component - in this case, that drink should be labeled differently on the menu. The waiter tried to explain that it was their own take on it, but it was literally gin and cucumber juice - and that was $21. My girlfriend ordered a drink that supposedly had a vodka base and some aperol, yet the drink had barely any alcohol at all in it. Both drinks that we ordered had ice cubes that were almost the size of the cups. We tried taking the ice cubes out, and the amount of the cocktail that was in the glass was less than half the cup. We normally order multiple drinks at places like this, but we left right after this disappointment. Service must be worked on since it’s a...