From ruins
May 3, 2023 5:12 AM Subscribe
If you've been to Budapest in the last twenty years you certainly encountered the famous "ruin-pubs". Now you can watch a five-part documentary about their history with English subtitles. New episodes are posted on every (Central European) Tuesday. First episode, Second episode. Narrated by Bori Péterfy.
The ruin pubs are awesome. I went to one called Szimpla Kert - often regarded as the OG ruin pub - and it was fascinating; it was on the site of a former factory, and they turned each of the individual offices into a different kind of bar; one was a wine bar, one was fancy cocktails, one a craft brewery, one a coffeehouse, one a juice bar, one was a computer cafe, etc., and some were just extra seating on top of the big cluster of tables in the courtyard. It felt like a perfect place for an outing with a group of friends because everyone in your group could scatter to go pick up whatever they wanted and then you'd all meet at a center table. And the whole place was decorated in such a way that it looked like the owners would periodically show up at a thrift store with a pickup truck and a big wad of cash and say "give us everything you've got, we'll figure out how to use it somehow".
And they also had a farmer's market in the courtyard area on Sunday afternoons, along with an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet in the room with the grill on the second floor. I ended up going twice - the second time was a mini-meetup with Skwirl, who lived there at the time - and they had a folk music concert on the mini stage, and halfway through this old guy spontaneously offered to give everyone a Romanian folk dance lesson.
....A co-worker at the time had a remarkably astute observation when I was telling him about it after my trip - "that sounds more Williamsburg than Williamsburg even is."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:47 AM on May 3, 2023 [9 favorites]
And they also had a farmer's market in the courtyard area on Sunday afternoons, along with an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet in the room with the grill on the second floor. I ended up going twice - the second time was a mini-meetup with Skwirl, who lived there at the time - and they had a folk music concert on the mini stage, and halfway through this old guy spontaneously offered to give everyone a Romanian folk dance lesson.
....A co-worker at the time had a remarkably astute observation when I was telling him about it after my trip - "that sounds more Williamsburg than Williamsburg even is."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:47 AM on May 3, 2023 [9 favorites]
Oh - I forgot the whole alley full of food trucks permanently parked next door, that gave you more food options than the basic pub grub grill upstairs.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:52 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:52 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
I lived in Budapest from ’85 to ’91 and went to a lot of the places mentioned in Ep 1 on a regular basis. In fact, Tilos az Á was a 5 minute walk from my apartment. Fekete lyuk was another place I went to. It is indeed nice to remember back on these places.
Köszi
posted by Cu_wire at 9:07 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
Köszi
posted by Cu_wire at 9:07 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]
Thanks for this post! These places are great - wish I had been able to spend more time at Szimpla Kert when I was in Budapest a few years ago but was basically just in and out. Also, though not technically a ruin pub, Élesztőház is worth a few visits too, one of the best uses of former industrial space I've ever seen.
posted by remembrancer at 9:57 AM on May 3, 2023
posted by remembrancer at 9:57 AM on May 3, 2023
Kinda reminds me of the McMenamins projects, but cooler. I'll have to check this out.
posted by credulous at 12:55 PM on May 3, 2023
posted by credulous at 12:55 PM on May 3, 2023
You can find tons of bars in Budapest, but I can only think of about two or three places that deserve to be called classic ruin pubs. The Szimpla exists as a kind of tourist musuem of a ruin pub: if you go on a weekend night you wait behind velvet ropes at the entrance and there will be nary a local Hungarian to be found inside. (The Sunday farmer market at Szimpla is great ... but you won't find a single Hungarian local except the sellers there.)
Don't forget that these films are a documentary of an era that ended more than a decade ago - there are very few actual ruin pubs left in Budapest, and the folks interviewed here in these first two installmants (all involved in the alternative-squat ruin bars of 25 years ago) today manage today regular, trendy bars with little of the crazy feel that the old places like Raczkert, Tilos Az A, Mumus, West Balkan or Nincs Pardon oozed with. There are some outdoor garden bars (not ruin pubs) and a few large dive bars, but the classic ruin pub built around a squatted courtyard with a renewable party license to serve alcohol is a thing of the past.
What has not (yet?) been addressed is that a lot of the areas touted as full of ruin pubs have become hypertourism distaster zones. I live in the 7th district and we simply do not go out on summer nights anymore, because the streets are taken over by howling drunks from all over attracted by the low budget franchised "7 shots for a quid!" bars (which are owned by folks close to the FIDESZ government, as are 80% of the bars in the district.) The Government knows a money maker when it sees one, and "ruin-bar tourism" says KA-CHING! KA-CHING! And our local district government ignores the protests of the residents in the district, because, well, I guess we don't pay them as much as the owners of the bars do.
posted by zaelic at 12:38 AM on May 4, 2023 [1 favorite]
Don't forget that these films are a documentary of an era that ended more than a decade ago - there are very few actual ruin pubs left in Budapest, and the folks interviewed here in these first two installmants (all involved in the alternative-squat ruin bars of 25 years ago) today manage today regular, trendy bars with little of the crazy feel that the old places like Raczkert, Tilos Az A, Mumus, West Balkan or Nincs Pardon oozed with. There are some outdoor garden bars (not ruin pubs) and a few large dive bars, but the classic ruin pub built around a squatted courtyard with a renewable party license to serve alcohol is a thing of the past.
What has not (yet?) been addressed is that a lot of the areas touted as full of ruin pubs have become hypertourism distaster zones. I live in the 7th district and we simply do not go out on summer nights anymore, because the streets are taken over by howling drunks from all over attracted by the low budget franchised "7 shots for a quid!" bars (which are owned by folks close to the FIDESZ government, as are 80% of the bars in the district.) The Government knows a money maker when it sees one, and "ruin-bar tourism" says KA-CHING! KA-CHING! And our local district government ignores the protests of the residents in the district, because, well, I guess we don't pay them as much as the owners of the bars do.
posted by zaelic at 12:38 AM on May 4, 2023 [1 favorite]
To be implicated in a thread referencing both McMenamins and Szimpla Kert hits a little too close to home for me as a born and raised Portlander and an adopted Budapesti
Another thing they have in common is that locals and natives will talk all the shit about Szimpla and McMenamins being too commercialized, but you still take visiting family and friends to Kennedy School or to Szimpla Kert. Of course, you try to be smart about it, like picking a slow night or a special event. The night with the folk dancing still sticks in my mind as one of the most magical Szimpla Kert visits!
The difference is that McMenamins hires architects to open whereas the original ruin pubs really were reclaimed spaces. Actually many of my regular haunts went ashes to ashes, dust to dust without many people noticing when they were finally demolished
Berlin has a Szimpla Kert with the same owners/same name but it’s not the same. It’s like the Disneyland version of New Orleans. But there’s a mood for both
When your night starts at any of the clubbiest of the ruin pubs, you know you’re going to have a night where you remember why you should act your age (Fogas, Dobaz, Instant, ötkert, Morrisons 2) oof. If you’re lucky you end the night at a kebob spot and if you’re unlucky you somehow find yourself at one of the chain bars like ördög drinking ever cheaper drinks
People staying for longer visits get the extended tour that shows the places we go for real. Aurora is a politically conscious club/ruin pub that is often under political threat for LGBTQ friendliness and in a part of town that felt perfectly safe to me but where many native Hungarians would warn us about. Always had fun there. There was a low-key ruin pub that we discovered in my last year that became a regular stop but I can’t remember the name. Koleves was always pleasant, too
posted by Skwirl at 8:41 PM on May 4, 2023
Another thing they have in common is that locals and natives will talk all the shit about Szimpla and McMenamins being too commercialized, but you still take visiting family and friends to Kennedy School or to Szimpla Kert. Of course, you try to be smart about it, like picking a slow night or a special event. The night with the folk dancing still sticks in my mind as one of the most magical Szimpla Kert visits!
The difference is that McMenamins hires architects to open whereas the original ruin pubs really were reclaimed spaces. Actually many of my regular haunts went ashes to ashes, dust to dust without many people noticing when they were finally demolished
Berlin has a Szimpla Kert with the same owners/same name but it’s not the same. It’s like the Disneyland version of New Orleans. But there’s a mood for both
When your night starts at any of the clubbiest of the ruin pubs, you know you’re going to have a night where you remember why you should act your age (Fogas, Dobaz, Instant, ötkert, Morrisons 2) oof. If you’re lucky you end the night at a kebob spot and if you’re unlucky you somehow find yourself at one of the chain bars like ördög drinking ever cheaper drinks
People staying for longer visits get the extended tour that shows the places we go for real. Aurora is a politically conscious club/ruin pub that is often under political threat for LGBTQ friendliness and in a part of town that felt perfectly safe to me but where many native Hungarians would warn us about. Always had fun there. There was a low-key ruin pub that we discovered in my last year that became a regular stop but I can’t remember the name. Koleves was always pleasant, too
posted by Skwirl at 8:41 PM on May 4, 2023
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posted by wenestvedt at 6:26 AM on May 3, 2023 [1 favorite]