Top shelf tipples on the Liffey
Quay 14 Bar and the attached Morrison Grill were renovated in 2018
Quay 14 Bar and the Morrison Grill has undergone a total transformation in recent years and the result is a very slick and elegant city bar, a snug oasis from the busy hustle and bustle of life outside its doors on Dublin’s quays. The well-known Morrison Dublin on the city’s Ormond Quay opened its doors in 1999 to much fanfare and has maintained its stylish urban feel in the decades since. This is the first hotel in Ireland to join the Curio Collection by Hilton, due to its unique character and style. A recent investment of €4million guided by interior architects NODA (Nikki O’Donnell Architects),with wonderful art curated by Art Loves has earned it a 5-star hotel rating by Fáilte Ireland, coupled with a Gold level rating from Green Tourism, an internationally recognised award for sustainable tourism. The hotel is more than ready to ride the wave of post-pandemic pent-up demand, where tourists and visitors are happy to indulge and even splurge a little more than normal in order to have a great experience.
Interior overhaul
The bi-fold windows in both the bar and restaurant act as a gate to the city
Quay 14 Bar and the attached Morrison Grill had already gone through a renovation in 2018 which transformed the space. Simon Smyth, food and beverage operations manager says that this €750,000 design overhaul improved the whole feel of the bar. “The idea was to give more seating in the restaurant and bar, improve space utilisation and at the same time improve the flow and make the space brighter,” he explains. It was redesigned by Elizabeth Kirby and David Loughnane from Invent Interiors. The colour scheme is of earth tones with bright green banquette seating. The furniture consists of bespoke Italian leather stools, dining chairs and lounge chairs and the bar counter is made from Italian marble. “The bi-fold windows in both the bar and restaurant act as a gate to the city,” explains Smyth. “They allow more light into the room and show off the wonderful views of the Liffey. We have frosted mirrors in Quay 14 Bar to draw in extra light and the walls in Quay14 have mosaics from Irish artists,” he explains. The result is a very plush yet contemporary space which is bright and fresh during the day and cosy and effortlessly chic at night.
The Top Shelf menu
Simon Smyth, food and beverage operations manager
Designing the space to look and feel right is the first challenge but then the bar itself needs to offer something special and Smyth simultaneously launched Quay 14’s Top Shelf menu in November 2018, the idea behind it was to make top shelf products slightly more accessible to everyone. “We wanted to make quality more accessible and provide some spirits that are not available elsewhere and place some higher-end spirits at a more affordable price. We have a passion for quality, whether it’s using premium spirits in cocktails or offering premium once in a lifetime spirits, and our clientele expect the best,” he states. “The Top Shelf menu is a beautifully curated leather menu and probably the toughest menu I have ever had to write as there are so many good brands but unfortunately you can’t include everything.” “I really wanted top shelf [drinks] to move. We have a €3,000 bottle of Remy Louis XIII Cognac there that another hotel has too and they sell two shots a year of it. We sell it for half the price they do as we don’t want to make huge margin on it but make it more accessible. It still doesn’t make it cheap but more accessible,” he says. While a full shot of the top-shelf tipple would cost around €160, Smyth explains that customers of Quay 14 can enjoy a15ml shot for €60 or a 25ml shot for €110.
He admits that it’s obviously still out of many people’s price range but it does pique the interest of mainly American tourists and attracts connoisseurs who will come to the bar especially to try these rare spirits but he really stresses that they are available for anyone who wishes to try them. “I know we are doing it right when we had the owners of drinks companies coming in to have a look at our new menu,” he proudly states. You can clearly see the passion and pride that comes with working in such a high profile bar and with such prestigious brands.
Local community
The Morrison is the first hotel in Ireland to join the Curio Collection by Hilton
The hotel is very conscious of its sustainability credentials and this is evident throughout. It has teamed up with Taste the Island, a Failte Ireland initiative to ensure that businesses source their food and drinks as close to home as possible. They display this on their food menu in the Morrison Grill with a map of Ireland with all their producers featuring on it to illustrate how close to home they source from. This makes everything they do very transparent. As regards to local provenance with the drinks, Smyth explains that there is a real emphasis on local producers and suppliers on their new spring menu. “Boatyard Distillery, which is on Lough Erne and has a big carbon neutral commitment and this will be on our new spring menu as both our gin and vodka martini serving, making our martini’s Irish. Istil Vodka from the heart of the Boyne Valley is also joining the menu. In the past we had Ballykeefe Distillery from Kilkenny pouring as our house vodka and gin. And currently on the menu we have Stillgarden Distillery from Inchicore, so we couldn’t be more local.” Stillgarden Distillery runs the Social Botanist Project with their master distiller which introduces bartenders to gardening, foraging, harvesting and botany, which Smyth says was “really interesting and educational”. They also have a couple of gins on the menu from Echlineville Distillery in Newtownards along with a massive selection of whiskeys from every corner of the country. The carbonated waters, sodas and tonics come from Poachers Drinks in Wexford so they certainly striving to live up to their ‘local first’ promise.
Changes in customer behaviours
Rory Rooney, deputy general manager
The focus on food and drink provenance adds to the whole customer experience which ties in with a change in their customers’ behaviours since before the pandemic, according to Rory Rooney, the hotel’s deputy general manager. “People don’t go for house wine any more. They might instead choose a Rioja Reserve or the like. We are now seeing people spending more but consuming less and going home earlier. The consumer likes to treat themselves on a night out and indulge in better food and higher quality drinks, rather than over-indulgence,” he explains. Cocktails, which used to be popular for after dinner have now become more commonplace. “They are getting a cocktail before and during dinner when it used to be just after. People don’t stay out as late but trade up for more expensive drinks. They are after a nice experience,” says Rooney. The proof is in the pudding with profits up 20% since before Covid. “This was the first area to recover. Once the US market was able to come back, we were breaking even,” he explains.
Challenges and opportunities
Some of the wonderful art that adorns the walls of the Morrison Hotel
No matter how well things are going there are still challenges in the industry and the biggest one for the bar industry is price increases, explains Smyth. “We have to endure price increases a few times a year. We don’t know what price we’ll be buying Coca-Cola at in five months time so I try to set prices for 12 months with my suppliers. And we also don’t want to be dealing with 30 different companies. With our Green Tourism we don’t want 20/30 deliveries a week either. It’s made us think more about that side of things too.”
As for staff, Rooney admits that skilled staff can be difficult to find but that they have managed to attract great people because staff are treated very well here. “We’ve been able to attract a lot of excellent colleagues. They don’t do long days or split shifts anymore – we never asked them to do that in the first place. We take care of people here.” Derek Yu is the bar manager and there are five other full time and one part time staff member. Smyth calls it a “small but tightly skilled unit”. Both Rooney and Smyth are clearly passionate about what they do and it’s obvious that a lot of hard work has gone into making this a really unique and welcoming space. Rooney explains that the clientele is a nice mix of tourists and locals. “It remains one of the high end hotels that are not housed in a Georgian building. We are more hip and more casual and the music is a big thing. Everyone wants to sit by the window and watch the world go by,” he says. It’s hardly surprising as who wouldn’t want to sit by the Liffey and enjoy all this wonderful bar has to offer!
