There’s no doubt Little Creatures pub brewery is a great place to enjoy a pizza and a few pints with some mates in the spring sunshine. And now, a new concept from the Little Creatures crew has provided a space that’s equally welcoming when the sun has se
There’s no doubt Little Creatures pub brewery is a great place to enjoy a pizza and a few pints with some mates in the spring sunshine. And now, a new concept from the Little Creatures crew has provided a space that’s equally welcoming when the sun has set.
Called Creatures Loft, the new venue is located adjacent to the main pub in a separate building bought by the brewery last year.
Effectively, the building has been cut in half, with one portion demolished to make way for new brewing facilities in the new year, while the remaining space has been converted into Creatures Loft supper club and wine bar, plus a function room.
The business’s new offices are downstairs, with the old offices in the main brewery building demolished to make way for extensions to the rear beer garden, due for completion before Christmas.
There are two distinct spaces at The Loft. The first is the supper club and wine bar, which is a large 200-person capacity room broken up by groovy re-upholstered lounge chairs of different colours and sizes.
It offers a relaxing-yet-vibrant environment to enjoy a good drop of wine and nibble on a selection of food, such as chilled marinated prawns ($10), oysters ($3.50 each), toasted sandwiches ($9) and apple, pork and herb sausage rolls ($11).
Overseeing the loft development was Little Creatures head of hospitality Miles Hull, who co-owns a share of Fremantle’s Harvest Restaurant.
Mr Hull says the team wanted to create a distinct space for the lounge bar, while at the same time linking it to the Little Creatures venue.
So they pulled up all the carpet and left the concrete bare, as is the case with the Little Creatures pub.
One of the outdoor balconies will also have views into the brewing operations, when they are built next year.
Creatures Loft has been designed as a place to hang out with your mates in the evenings, with the music providing ambient background noise rather than thumping beats that can drown out the conversations.
The lounge bar is pitched to an audience much older than the excited teenagers who used to frequent the business prior to its sale – the Harbourside nightclub.
“There are plenty of places for young crowds in Fremantle but for our market there really isn’t much,” Mr Hull says.
The entrance no longer comes off the front of the building but is tucked away around to the side, something designed to keep it a little hidden from the main foot traffic and encourage more word-of-mouth visits.
Creatures Loft has an outstanding rear balcony, right atop of the water with sweeping views of the ocean and Fremantle fishing harbour.
It is the result of stripping back the old façade, putting in new glass walls and ceiling structures, which more than doubles the outdoor space of the previous balcony and significantly opens up the views.
Aside from the lounge bar, Creatures Loft has a function room that will be used to host a regular arts program as well as opening up the functions market to Little Creatures.
“We have never been able to do functions because we haven’t been able to make it work, but now we have a dedicated space and area so it allows us to do that,” Mr Hull says.
The function room is similar to the main bar, featuring reupholstered chairs and tall lamps with huge brightly coloured lampshades.
It also has its own bar.
The main difference is the stage, which Mr Hull says will be used to host bands and possibly theatre productions and other arts events.
He says Little Creatures won’t become a live music venue but instead he wanted to mix-up its offering.
The function room can cater for up to 200 people.
