The first generation of Harry Potter fans have been able to legally drink for years now (especially in Canada, where the drinking age in most regions is 18). And since the world — lacking a new Harry Potter book to anticipate — can seem a drab place, it wouldn’t come as any surprise if stats showed they (fine, we) drink profusely. (Turns out we’re not doing too badly with wine.)
Now, there’s a place for these early HP fans to combine the adult escapism of drinking with the childhood escapism found in HP‘s goofy multisyllabic names, nonsensical sports, surprising jelly beans, Butterbeers, centaurs, hippogriffs, childhood trauma, adolescent malaise, war, and quintessential evil. (Okay, so there are a few reasons all grown up Harry Potter fans might take to drinking.)
For, a Harry Potter themed bar has opened in Toronto. It’s called The Lockhart (oddly named after the narcissistic Defense Against the Dark Arts professor — played by Kenneth Branagh in the second film), and its décor and drinks feature references to the books (the sweetest of which, perhaps, is a heart-shaped neon sign containing the final words of the last book: “All Was Well”).
That being said, from the website’s gallery, it mostly looks like an attractive, not even particularly gimmicky bar. Paris Xerx — one of the bar’s co-owners, who self-sorted as a Hufflepuff — said in Toronto Now:
Without knowing any of the Harry Potter stuff, you already will think of this as a cool bar. You’d come here and see the stag’s head on the wall and go ‘Wow, I love that,’ but a Harry Potter fan might say ‘That’s a Patronus.’
The weekly newspaper noted that while a few cocktails allude to the books in obvious ways — there’s the “Befuddlement Brew,” “The Shacklebolt,” and “Ludo’s Debt” — there’s also one that’s “so obscure that the owners have promised a free one if you figure it out.”
https://twitter.com/TheLockhartTO/status/641652350378213376/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Of course, the big question is whether they serve Butterbeer. And it turns out they’re trying to figure out how to get it onto the menu, but first they need to come up with a non-copyrighted name. And then the next big question is how to Apparate to Toronto. And then the next big question after that is how to go back to regaining any modicum of self-respect after having written that last sentence.