Brace yourselves: it’s a V****tine’s Day event.
Oh, we do love a good PR stunt that results in a free drink! Hot on the heels of Old Street’s gin and tonic vending machine, seriously seventies bar and restaurant Bobby Fitzpatrick have decided to hand out the free bevs in honour of Valentine’s Day. All you have to do to get one is take a picture of your first love or childhood sweetheart to the bar. Easy as pie.
In return for this trip down memory lane/heartbreak alley (delete as appropriate), the bar staff will furnish you with a free Alison Mahoney cocktail. Alison Mahoney, it must be noted, was Bobby’s own first love, now immortalised in cocktail form. It’s full of rum and ginger, although presumably Alison was not. Nostalgia is in keeping with the whole theme of Bobby Fitzpatrick’s, where shag pile carpets, retro wallpaper, and 70s board games fill the place.
The whole exercise – aside from being about dollar dollar bills, y’all – is to inspire Londoners to reflect on our first loves and the ones that got away. My first love was Sabrina the Teenage Witch, so I have one burning question: will they give me a free cocktail if I rock up with a picture of Melissa Joan Hart?
Find Bobby Fitzpatrick at 273 West End Lane, West Hampstead, NW6 1QS. Nearest station is West Hampstead.