A font by any other name

We're finally starting to feel the effect of our new small bar licence here in Perth, with a number of interesting little places opening up in recent months. One such place I've been meaning to check out for a while is Helvetica, a very cool little place in a laneway off St George's Terrace in the city. A few of us headed there after work last Friday and were disappointed to find it at capacity. This is the problem with the bar scene in Perth - these small bars have been so long coming (not their fault) that everyone is chomping at the bit to get into them, which works a bit against what they are supposed to be - nice, small, chilled-out places you can go for a relaxed drink or two. Hopefully as more and more open up this will improve a bit. Anyway, we stuck it out in the queue at Helvetica for about half an hour and were rewarded with a fantastic little place inside the doors. The fit-out was impressive without being over-the-top (my interior-design-guru friend Eko was having palpitations over the woven vinyl on the floors and walls), there were comfortable seats to be had (always welcome on a Friday night!), and the drinks were delicious and well-priced. In fact, I think I discovered my new favourite white wine. We also snacked on some corn chips and salsa, which was just about the best salsa I'd ever had (probably helped by the fact that I was hungry enough to eat my arm but it was still pretty damn good!). Whisky is what this place is all about but being somewhat workworn we all just wanted a drink fast and weren't really in the mood for experimenting...so maybe next time! What impressed me most about Helvetica was the service - despite it being a Friday night and a full bar, we were really well-looked-after and were even able to order drinks from our table, a service which is just about extinct these days. With this good experience under my belt, I'm now keener than ever to check out some of the other small bars popping up around town...especially the one in Leederville due to open in coming weeks, which might just become our new local!