One of the areas of our house that I’m super excited to style is our wet bar! I never imagined I’d have a wet bar lol but here we are! While the rest of our first floor is going to be more neutral, we’ve decided to have fun with this space and update it with tropical home bar vibes.
Let’s be honest, we’ve been drinking a lot more while we’ve been stuck at home. At least now I can have a super chic space for it! 😬
The wet bar area is off of the living room, just to the right of our front door. It’s already got a bunch of cabinets, a sink, and mirror shelving. We’ve got lots of ideas for how we want to design this space, and I’m sharing some inspiration images as well as my own mood board for our tropical home bar!
One of my favorite SF restaurants in terms of designs is Leo’s Oyster Bar. If you’re in the Bay Area you’ve probably seen their iconic style on your Instagram feed. It’s like tiki bars, but make it fashion, ya know? You can read an interview with the designers here.
We’re not going for an aesthetic that’s as over the top as Leo’s (even though I love their space), but we’ll definitely have some Leo’s-inspired design elements.
Currently, the wet bar has a mirror on the wall and shelves, which feels a bit dated to us, so I had the idea of covering the mirrors with a tropical wallpaper, and painting the shelves a dark color like a matte black or navy, depending on the wallpaper. We’re thinking something dark and a little moody for the wallpaper. We’ll see how this little DIY turns out, haha!
We’ve already gotten the faux cowhide rug for this area—I shared it over on Insta and I’m so in love with this find! I know it’s not really “tropical” but it just looks so good in the space and with the type of furniture we have in mind, including this stunning leather ottoman from The Citizenry. We’re still on the hunt for the perfect lounge chairs, but definitely thinking something mid-century modern/rattan.
On the wall opposite from the statement wallpaper, we’ve been slowly finding boho pieces to hang in a sort of collage style. So far we’ve got everything on the mood board—a larger gold oval mirror (love the idea of the wallpaper being in view in the reflection of a large mirror), a couple of art prints that match the tropical vibe, a smaller gold mirror, and this wood clock that we found at Target. Btw, Target’s Project 62 line is SO good if you’re looking for home decor.
There’s already lighting in this wet bar area, but I’m thinking a simple drum pendant light would look really cool here.
And then last but not least, a good wet bar has to have a serious cocktail kit! We got this copper one from Macy’s, and I love that it has all the things, and comes with an ice bucket and a tray.
We do already have about 500 different glasses (wine, champs, snifters, coups, rocks, tumblers, highballs, and god knows what else) so I think we’re all set in that arena.
I’m still looking for a couple more accent pieces to complete the space (just bought this super cute and very Leo’s Oyster Bar-esque tray to go on the ottoman), but I’m liking the direction our tropical home bar is headed in!
I’m also thinking it’d be nice to do some kind of built-in fridge inside the cabinets. We have the wine cave outside to store wine (I know, I still can’t believe that we have a wine cave), but Omied has so much beer and all those bottles and cans really start to overwhelm the fridge. So it’d be nice for him to be able to store his beer in the wet bar.
So excited for this tropical home bar project to come to life!
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Elise Armitage is an entrepreneur and founder of What The Fab, a travel + lifestyle blog based in California. At the beginning of 2019, Elise left her corporate job at Google to chase her dreams: being an entrepreneur and helping women find fabulous in the everyday. Since then, she’s launched her SEO course Six-Figure SEO, where she teaches bloggers how to create a passive revenue stream from their website using SEO. Featured in publications like Forbes, Elle, HerMoney, and Real Simple, Elise is a firm believer that you can be of both substance and style.
