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Shore Leave

4 Feb 2024

While not a true tiki bar, Shore Leave's cocktail menu always has a well-crafted, recognizable rotation of tropical/tiki drinks, often with modern updates. Despite its lack of traditionality, it does pay light homage to tropical island aesthetics. Though, in the end, they make the greatest effort to capture the very young, hip, white collar professional crowd who aren't looking for or don't have a taste for immersive kitsch.

As a business, their theory of and ethical stances on tiki are bizarre and almost openly out of step with historical reality, which is a huge bummer. Not every tiki venue needs to be a Mai Kai or Vic's, but should their stances update with the evidence, I could see them leaning much more into what's defined that atmosphere over the past century some day.

Tiki Bar

Shore Leave

Boston, Massachusetts, United States

Opened November 2018.

From their website: "Shore Leave is our interpretation of a tropical escape through the lens of our love for Boston's rich dining scene. Named after a sailor's leisure time on dry land, Shore Leave's tropical cocktails take you away from the hustle and bustle. We hope this space, music, and most importantly, our Shore Leave family, make every moment here feel like watching the sun go down with your feet in the sand. Tucked in off the main drag and just below the street in Boston's South End, Shore Leave is here to bring you along on our everyday vacation."

This bar and restaurant has received high praise for its cocktails and cuisine. However, if you are going there to check out tiki carvings, you will be disappointed. In one interview about building out the concept for the bar, Chef Lynch explains: We were really excited to work with them on figuring out how we can make tiki interesting in a basement without cultural appropriation. Trying to bend more towards the tropical and jungle themes and less towards the Polynesian idol themes was really important to us, and to not make it look like we just hung a bunch of knickknacks everywhere.

Despite this avoidance of idols, you may still have spotted some vintage tiki mugs on display if you looked carefully...although in May 2021 the bar announced a re-doubling of their efforts to stamp out anything that might be interpreted as cultural appropriation or insensitivity.