Despite challenging times for nightlife balancing business opportunity with pandemic risk, Capitol Hill is now home to “Seattle’s newest premiere club” — kind of.
The Mint Lounge debuted earlier this year on Pine below Melrose in the connective zone between downtown and Capitol HIll. This week’s events will include a Trophouse Thursdays night of Afrobeat and Dance Hall and a glamorous Friday “All Black Party” where the dress code will be “strictly enforced.”
The new life for the old Baltic Room follows the 2019 acquisition of the club by new owners. That same ownership is in place with the change in branding as the club sets out to make a new name for itself in the Capitol Hill nightlife scene.
CHS reported on new owners owners Rachel Keith and Rahsaan Henry taking over the club in 2019 but have yet to hear back from them about the Mint Lounge change. A check of business and liquor license information shows the same ownership remains in place.
The new name and style at the club is part of a string of changes over the past three years. In early 2018, CHS reported on the Baltic switching hands after longtime owner Jason Brotman decided to part ways with the lower Pike/Pine club. That new ownership, it turned out, would be temporary as Keith and Henry were next in line. The Baltic Room dates back to 1997 when Capitol Hill nightlife legend Linda Derschang opened the club as a piano bar.
In its new incarnation, the Mint Lounge emphasizes a more upscale approach with a dress code enforced after 10 PM forbidding baggy clothes and flip flops. “After years and experience of travel all across the globe, Mint Seattle Bar and Nightclub was started to provide experiences and culture from countries all over the world,” its owners say. “With great music, bottle service, and premiere mixology.”
Masks are also currently part of the dress code again for all Capitol Hill clubs under the restored statewide mandate but Mint is not currently requiring proof of vaccination or a recent negative COVID test for entry like most clubs, bars, and restaurants on the Hill. It is not alone in that regard. Q Nightclub on Broadway is also not currently requiring vaccination. Most other Hill clubs including Neighbours are requiring the documentation for entry.
The Mint Lounge is now open weekends at 1207 Pine. You can learn more at instagram.com/themintloungeseattle.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CS2VH-2PmCO/
$5 A MONTH TO HELP KEEP CHS PAYWALL-FREE
🌈🐣🌼🌷🌱🌳🌾🍀🍃🦔🐇🐝🐑🌞🌻
Subscribe to CHS to help us hire writers and photographers to cover the neighborhood. CHS is a pay what you can community news site with no required sign-in or paywall. To stay that way, we need you.
Become a subscriber to help us cover the neighborhood for $5 a month -- or choose your level of support 👍
It my day, they called it Kid Mohair — and we liked it! *shakes raver cane*
This place is so ungodly loud from the sidewalk. Good luck to the new apartment tenants across the street.
Move to the suburbs.
Not until you defund SPD now
Forget the noise. My takeaways:
I looked on their IG and the photo accompanying their post about hiring “bottle service girls” [sic] makes me think it’s basically an upscale Hooters.
Yep, my thoughts exactly. Not sure which part of the globe they were touring for inspiration but both their new name as well as their IG content I’d associate with what’s called “Dorfdisco” where I come from…missed opportunity. In addition, their COVID protocols seem beyond questionable given where we’re at…