Cactus Club to Vancouver’s Financial District; Surrey Follows…

Vancouver’s financial district has long been a barren wasteland for decent bars and restaurants: while several excellent restaurants populate the district for the lunchtime business crowd (Hy’s, Rex, etc.) few bars have existed for evening entertainment (notable exceptions: Smiley’s; Moose’s).

That changed recently with the opening of a new Cactus Club in a purpose-built building beside the Bentall V tower.

The new Cactus Club is impressive: an enormous patio frames the building; the bar is in an island configuration (thereby maximizing bar space for patrons); the restaurant proper is spacious and huge.

In short, the new Cactus Club has all the makings of a great after work and evening hang out.

Unfortunately, there’s one big problem with the big new restaurant: the crowd. Instead of the sophisticated, after-work crowd from the financial district one would expect of the new bar, the crowd instead consists almost entirely of Surrey types: crass, loud, superficial and simple. In the heart of the district with the highest disposable income, the biggest expense accounts and the most discerning employees one finds an oasis for the red neck, low income set. Crass superficiality, absent any irony, rules at the new Cactus Club. It’s like being at the Guggenheim and finding an exhibit of preschool crayon drawings better suited carefully tacked behind suburban fridge magnets.

As such, we highly recommend an alternate venue, any alternate venue.

And here’s hoping the soon-to-be-opened Joey Tomatoes, at the base of Bentall I tower, will draw less of the mouth-breathing, knuckle dragging crowd…