Exploring the art in bartending.
In a way, I think my passion for pushing the boundaries of bartending probably started when I took up magic in my early twenties.
I love playing with people’s perceptions and watching their amazement when they realise something isn’t what it seemed, and I wanted to bring this into my work.
When I opened Lounge Bohemia in 2007, people thought I was mad to stick it in a basement without any street sign, to make it by appointment (pretty unusual for a bar in those days) and to operate a no suit policy.
But like a magic trick – which relies on different cues to influence the way a person perceives something – I wanted all the different elements of the bar to add up to an experience that felt intimate and theatrical.
The ‘bohemia’ in Lounge Bohemia isn’t just a reference to the region of the Czech Republic that I come from, but also to the unconventional nature of my bartending. Luckily it seems I’m not the only person with a passion for avant-garde cocktails. Soon after opening, Lounge Bohemia was included in The World’s 50 Best Bars and is still going strong.
In 2008 I started training myself in molecular cooking techniques, and loved the way they could be used to create highly visual and performative cocktail experiences. I use sight, smell, textures and flavour to make cocktails that are little multi-sensory adventures.
From volcano cocktails erupting with bubbles, to candyfloss cocoons dissolving into butterflies; I always try to create a sense of fun and wonder in my work - to explore the art in bartending.
Over the years I’ve had the pleasure of developing highly creative cocktails and designing immersive experiences for esteemed brands such as Selfridges, Rolls Royce, Alexander McQueen and Van Cleef & Arpels, as well as collaborating with some of the world’s best restaurants and chefs, such as Nuno Mendes, Olia Hercules, Tom Levy and Premek Forejt.
Whilst London has been my home for 25 years, I’ve been lucky enough to continue working in the Czech Republic throughout that time, including opening a pop up in Prague in 2015 (which ended up staying open a year longer than planned!) And in 2019 I had the huge honour of being awarded the Silver Jan Masaryk Honorary Medal for ‘contributions to the development of relations between the Czech Republic and the United Kingdom’.