Le Lounge Encapsulates What A Hotel Bar Should Feel Like

The boutique hotel No Vacancy’s bar Le Lounge is definitely for lounging, despite its new and much larger space. Spencer Sight, the hotel’s owner, relocated the stylish bar from its original second floor location, only accessible from an alley and long flight of stairs, to a newly acquired ground floor spot in the same Crossroads building.

The original Le Lounge had that air of excitement that hotel bars are known for, and for those who enjoyed its original location’s exclusive coolness, don’t worry—the bar’s new locale has the same sexy grandeur, just with a bit more room and seating.

No Vacancy (1717 Wyandotte St., KCMO), an eight-room hotel with event space, takes up about 30 percent of the much larger Monogram Building, which was built in 1925 for film company Monogram Pictures. So when the building’s corner space became available, acquiring it seemed like an obvious choice.

Sight has completely renovated the industrial space, and yet Le Lounge’s new digs invoke a feeling of timelessness.

Original elements, such as exposed brick and a front door with transom windows, along with a dark-green vintage circular banquette from Midtown’s vintage market Urban Mining, make the bar feel like it’s been there for ages. However, as much as Sight loves sourcing vintage furniture, he says it can be difficult for such pieces to stand up in a commercial setting. Instead, he designed almost all of Le Lounge’s furniture himself and had an architect in Istanbul build it.

With orange velvet armchairs, deep maroon banquettes and a cherry wood-lined bar, Le Lounge has that elusive romance and ritzy refinement essential to any hotel bar. Cream-colored scallop drapes cover the bar’s windows so it feels private. As a pedestrian, the only way you’d know there was a bar inside is by the small neon sign in the window that reads “cocktails.”

Le Lounge’s menu is full of classics, and I can’t help but recommend the martini. Lead bartender Manny Gomez uses liquid nitrogen, which helps the martini glass stay colder for longer. The no-frills cocktail is a hotel bar essential, and Le Lounge does it justice. 

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