Before there was an "entertainment district," Toronto scenesters headed to a wood-panelled bar on Bloor Street, hung with chandeliers and peach mirrors, that served sin in a cocktail glass, as well as the best eggs Benedict in town.
Its name was Bemelmans, after the famous New York watering hole, and for the hipsters who flocked there, the bar was Manhattan North, where style, sex and pink champagne flowed nightly.
"It was the centre hub of the wheel, where the clothes were fabulous, the makeup was great, the stars plentiful, the food good and the drinks wonderful," recalls Robert Gage, a society hairdresser who was a regular at the boîte, which closed in 1996 to make way for a fashion store.
Mr. Gage is a member of the Bemelmans old guard planning to bring all that fabulousness back with a reunion party at Indiva, the site of the original location at 83 Bloor St. W., on Nov. 2.
A fundraiser for AIDS hospice Casey House, Back to Bemelmans will honour the legions of Bemelmans patrons felled by HIV/AIDS. Bemelmans came of age in the era of disco, remember.
"But it wasn't a gay bar, and it wasn't a straight bar. It was a mixture of both, which is what made it very New York," observes Toronto real-estate agent Clifton Idyll. "A lot of movers and shakers went there, Anjelica Huston, Elton John, Richard Burton, everyone."
Tickets are $150 through http://www.gettickets.ca.