Hell or High Water — Restaurant in Louisville

Highly disappointed... We are cocktail conisours and the bartenders here are not. We had a reservation at a bar seat. The entry was exciting... A hidden door, down a staircase into a beautiful speakeasy. We were sat down at the bar where 2 clearly used water glasses were. We sat and the bartender greeted us as she poured water into the glasses. When we said the glasses were sitting there she said something along the lines of "I know. They're yours and that's why I'm filling them." She insisted that they were new even though one of the glasses had 2 inches of water in it. It was to the point that it was uncomfortable that we had to insist on switching the filled one out. Even after that she insisted on filling the other dry glass at our other seat saying that "this other glass looks dry so it must be clean". Hmm... How about you just replace it since clearly the one next to it was not new. It was struggle to convince to replace it. First mistake....

Menu - so so disappointing. There are better selections at the charcuterie place down the street (Cultured- a definite must do!!). When we asked about the ingredients in certain drinks, the bartender said "I'm not sure but I think...". That's not ok to me. You should be a master at your craft and know your menu.

Our order - my husband ordered a drink with Japanese gin. Another bartender heard the order and immediately told our server to be sure she finished the bottle that has the lemon infused in it and leave out the real lemon because the manager wants to finish the bottle. Umm...What?!?! That's not what he ordered and not ok.

Experience - After we received our drinks, we asked about one of the ingredients and the bartender said "I think there may be something similar to that in this drink.". That's confusing to me. She just made my drink so how does she not know what's in it?? Clearly there are premade mixes and she's not educated in this industry. We watched and listened while they made drinks for others. Someone at a table in the other part of the speakeasy wanted a key lime martini. Maybe that's not typical for Louisville, but at a speakeasy, you should be able to get what you want. We watched the bartenders complain to each other , make jokes with guests sitting at the bar, and Google recipes for a key lime martini. They had no idea what was in it or how to make it. They had no idea!!

In short, do NOT waste your time. We were so so excited to go here but left extremely disappointed. Go somewhere with real bartenders who don't have their bra straps hanging off their moo moos and truly know their menu. Like House of Commons in Frankfort -Truly...

The staff here was beyond rude. The waitress spilled water all over our table and did not apologize or clean it up. We had to ask for napkins to clean up the mess. The other patrons were loud and obnoxious and they were not told to "keep it down" as it was supposed to be a calm experience, not a rowdy bar. The waitress had only minimal and vague knowledge of the drinks, disappointing. The staff was dressed in torn jeans and a generally unkept appearance. The staff was also drinking. There was no manager onsite and the staff was unwilling to fix or even discuss problems. They just said that they could not and would not help. The real problem was that we had a "to go" bag of food with us as we entered. This was purchased from the restaurant we just left so my diabetic husband had food for later, back at the hotel. The hostess told us that we could not bring in outside food but she would keep it at the desk to pick up on the way out. Our group though this odd but we confirmed that we could pick it up on the way out and decided to go in and enjoy the night. We left after one drink due to bad service and overall weirdness of the night. On the way out, we stopped at the hostess desk and asked for our box and she said "you told me to throw it out so I did". WTH? We obviously did not ask her to throw out the recently purchased meal that was needed. No apology. No offering of anything at all. No compensation. She refused to discuss it and said that there was no manager there, just leave. I went back in and asked the bartender about this situation and she had the same attitude. The waitress then joined the conversation and the same attitude surfaced with her. We asked for the manager's info and was given James's email address. I did email him several times with no answer. We had to stop and get another box of food to replace the one she threw out. It seems like the kids are running the place while the manager is away and just doing whatever they want. But since the manager has refused to talk, I wonder if he is the true problem. I would definitely not recommend this place. There are plenty of great places to spend your money and get great service in Louisville....

First off, let me say that my boyfriend and I came here a few weeks ago and it was great. The wait time was an hour, which totally didn’t surprise me because...speakeasy-style bar, I get it. So we got a few drinks elsewhere, whatever. When we did get a spot, we loved the decor, drinks were really good, however, we waited almost a half hour for our drinks and I noticed how empty it was....there were just a few people at the bar and maybe three other small parties as well. Now this brings us to this weekend. We talked this place up to some of our friends who came to visit with us. We were quoted for an hour and half at 11:00pm, which, again, didn’t surprise me since it was a Saturday and we had 5 people. Plus the bar closes at 2am so we were willing to wait. However, this time the hostess was extremely rude and unnecessarily pretentious. She said “our bar only sits 10 people”. And I kindly asked “are you only seating the bar tonight or also the seating area?” She responds, “well it depends on how many reservations we have and how busy the servers are and it’s been a busy night so it could be a little earlier or a little later than what I quote you”....all during this time of taking our number and name, etc. she did not smile nor did she even look me in the eyes. Super weird. It also surprised me that she mentioned the servers because you would think that a place like this would be well equipped with adequate servers. At the end of it, we didn’t even get a text so we didn’t end up going there for a drink, which was extremely disappointing. We’ve been to several different speakeasy-style bars, but this place needs to calm down on its pretentiousness. First off, hire more staff if you can’t handle the busy weekends. Also, train your staff to create a more welcoming environment. Although I didn’t know what the place was like that night, I can assume from other reviews that people were waiting a long time for drinks and service, thus creating a long wait time for people waiting for a spot. I’m sorry, but this is just a Louisville speakeasy-style bar...take it easy on the stuck up atmosphere. 1 Star for the drinks and another for the decor. None for...