Tiki Bars
Jacoby's Tiki Bar
Enmore, New South Wales, Australia
This tiki bar in a suburb of Sydney, Australia opened in August 2017 by partners Pasan Wijesena, James Fury, Adrian Sanchez, and Stu Ellis. Inspired by the tiki-loving character Dr. Jacoby from Twin Peaks, the bar aims to deliver on nostalgia for both Polynesian Pop and the cult favorite television show. The walls are lined with matting and banana-leaf-motif wallpaper, the ceiling with straw matting, and the wooden back bar has several large mounted tikis carved in Queensland. Classic tropical drinks are served, some in tiki mugs.
Trader Vic's - at the Jumeirah Beach Hilton - Dubai
United Arab Emirates
This new Trader Vic's location opened at the Jumeirah Beach Hilton on March 4th, 2018. It offers indoor and outdoor seating overlooking the pool and the Arabian Gulf.
The restaurant also displays a lavish amount of artwork and tiki carvings, including one of the two large exterior tikis that used to flank the entrance to the Portland Trader Vic's before it closed (around 8' tall with large lips, a small nose, and concentric Tangaroan-style eyes).
Wahtiki Island Lounge
Hong Kong Island, Hong Kong SAR China (Closed)
Wahtiki Island Lounge was opened in Central Hong Kong in January 2017 by owner Philip Lee. Lee's father, Shi Wah Lee, worked for Trader Vic's for many years, including managing the London Trader Vic's during the '70s-'90s, and later helping Trader Vic's open locations around Europe and the Middle East. Philip Lee continued in the family tradition by opening his own tiki bar and Polynesian restaurant. The decor included bamboo, tapa cloth, and tikis, traditional Polynesian restaurant food, and tiki drinks served in tiki mugs.
Unfortunately, the restaurant was unable to come to terms on its lease agreement and announced its closure for Saturday, August 12th, 2023.
Tiki Island - Medford
Medford, Massachusetts, United States (Closed)
Tiki Island is a Chinese/Polynesian restaurant that opened in the mid-1980s in Medford, just north of Boston. The front area has a large moai, and the main dining room has a huge painted mural of a tropical scene, with a few tikis around the restaurant. The food includes some mid-century Polynesian-style Chinese favorites, including a flaming pu-pu platter, and tropical drinks are served in tiki mugs. A banquet hall in the back of the restaurant is unthemed.
Tiki Island has a sister restaurant in Hyannis, Tiki Port.
Luau Lounge
San Francisco, California, United States
Luau Lounge opened inside Players, a video game arcade on Pier 39 at Fisherman's Wharf, in 2012. The bar and restaurant overlooks San Francisco Bay, with large windows to take in the view. The decor includes tapa cloth, beachcomber lamps and tikis, but with full daylight on one side and a riotous arcade on the other, the mood is not one of escape despite some nice decor, including some Eugene Savage Matson Menu art on the far wall.
There is a full restaurant menu, and the tropical drinks menu on their website skews to the sweet and fruity end. However, that online drinks menu appears to date to 2013-2015 and the newer one from 2019-2022 is much improved. Both are shown below...
Marina Palms Apartments
Seal Beach, California, United States
This 54-unit apartment building was built in 1963 with a Polynesian theme, and was originally named Marina Lani. The entrance is a grand A-frame, with a dramatic lava rock wall intersecting it. Over time, the Polynesian details were removed and it was simply called Marina Apartments.
In 2009, a refresh of the communal spaces brought in fresh tropical landscaping and the addition of many new tikis, and the apartments were renamed Marina Palms. The color scheme was green/orange/yellow for this iteration.
As of 2021, the color scheme appears to be slate blue and white. The 2009 tikis are not as evident in promotional photos, although the honu/sea turtles can still be seen on the front.
Tiki Action Park
Centereach, New York, United States
Tiki Action Park is a tiki-themed miniature golf, arcade and amusement park in central Long Island, New York. There are go-karts, laser tag, and video games, but the big attraction is the outdoor, themed miniature golf course, complete with tikis, rock structures, and water features.
Before becoming tiki themed and changing the name to Tiki Action Park in 2010, it was called Castle Miniature Golf.
They do have a gift area inside where they sell tiki mugs, among other things.
Ollie Vee's Tiki Lounge
Leighton Buzzard, United Kingdom
Ollie Vee's, a vintage store in Leighton Buzzard, Bedfordshire, added a Tiki Lounge to one of its upper levels in 2014. During the day, store visitors can enjoy the space with a coffee from the Ollie Vee's cafe. The store is closed in the evenings, but they sometimes hold special evening events in the space, and it is available for private rental; for these special events, they are licensed to serve tropical cocktails. On Saturday afternoons, there is a ukulele jam. The space is clad in bamboo and matting, with tikis.
As of September 2024, the owners announced they would like to sell their bar to someone who would enjoy running their own Tiki Bar...
Dobbs House Luau - Dallas
Dallas, Texas, United States (Closed)
Dobbs House Luau opened at the Love Field airport in Dallas in the last week of November 1958. It was an early outpost of the then-new Dobbs House Luau chain, inspired by the Dobbs family's purchase of the Luau in Atlanta. Dobbs House was a chain of restaurants and hotel concessions, and already had the restaurant space in the airport. The family chose to re-theme some of their restaurants as Polynesian, including this one. Elaborate decor was installed, including many tikis, pufferfish, and water features. The restaurant operated successfully at Love Field until the Dallas-Fort Worth airport opened in 1974, which hurt business. The restaurant closed after 1974 (possibly as late as the 1980s), was temporarily a family entertainment space called "Llove" and has been used as office space for many years now. It was in the northwest corner of the mezzanine level.
Other Dobbs House Luau locations were in Memphis, Birmingham, Charlotte, Miami, Orlando, Lexington, Houston, and Louisville.
Adventure Island Mini Golf - Birmingham
Birmingham, United Kingdom (Closed)
Adventure Island Mini Golf was a tiki-themed miniature golf course, it opened in 2008 in Star City, Birmingham. The indoor course featured lots of faux rock work, bamboo, artificial palm trees, and many tikis and moai. There was a "tiki bar" that served light refreshments and a selection of bottled drinks.
In 2017, investor Mo Chaudry made a deal to expand the brand. A second location was then opened in 2020 at Stoke-On-Trent (Chaudry's already thriving Waterworld location) to give even more entertainment options. He planned to expand the brand even further with more locations in the future -- shooting for 20 locations by 2022 -- but then COVID happened, throwing future development into turmoil.
This location at Star City closed on January 19th, 2023. However, the Stoke-On-Trent location remains (at least as of 2024).
Pu-Pu Platter's
Mozac, France (Closed)
Pu-Pu Platter's was a bar, restaurant and nightclub in the small town of Mozac in central France's Auvergne region. It was opened in July 2016 by Alexandra Iwankow and Flavien Baster. The space was large, with a dance floor below and mezzanine seating above, all lined with bamboo and guarded by tikis.
As of 2020 and 2021, they added a pizzeria and built-out their location with an outdoor dining area and added trim and other decor -- using the downtime from Covid productively to add features for their customers.
Apparently, these additions were not enough. The restaurant closed Friday, September 15th, 2023.
The new owners re-named the space "Conquistador" and appear to have retained much of the bamboo and other natural materials in the decor, but are not upholding the tiki theme.
Pilikia
Dallas, Texas, United States (Closed)
Pilikia was a tiki bar and nightclub in Dallas, the name means "trouble" in Hawaiian. It opened in late January 2017. They served tiki drinks and shared bowl drinks, and had a small menu of food. The entrance was flanked by two tall tikis, with a large moai looking over. Inside, the decor was spare, with carved tiki stools, paper lantern lights, and some bamboo. There was an outdoor patio.
Closed in July 2018 after the city decided to go after several bars in the area that were not full restaurants in an area zoned for restaurants, not bars.