Each month, Moira Muldoon walks into a bar and writes about it. Here’s her look at the Bolla Bar at the Stoneleigh Hotel. Gotta tip for Muldoon? Leave it below.
At first glance, the Bolla Bar at the Stoneleigh Hotel is borderless. It’s hard to tell if you’re in the lobby or actually in the bar itself—or if somehow you’re in both at once. People wheel suitcases through. The sparkling chandeliers and the plush satin seating wrap around square marble columns and convey opulence and elegance. The smooth arch of the bar itself, a wooden semicircle, a proscenium of sorts, is lovely.
Rooms at the Stoneleigh start at $219, and the service at the bar is solid, the way you’d expect from a high-end hotel with a much-vaunted art deco style and a list of whites by the glass that start at $8 (happy hour wines are $5). When my glass neared empty, a server appeared. Water was refilled consistently, unobtrusively. My friend drank cosmopolitans, remarking that each was different in taste and texture and that each was good.
