I like drinking wine in small spaces. I don't know what it is about pairing a small, intimate wine bar and a good glass of wine, but the combination is magic. Recently I was recalling my experiences drinking wine in various small venues with good friends, and I got to thinking: why? What is the connection?
There is also the issue of small tastes, or flights that seem to be the norm in small wine shops and tasting rooms. In Europe, frequently, wine-centered drinking establishments will offer very small glasses of inexpensive wines as a mainstay of their lists. Groups of tasters will order multiple rounds, which become catalysts to group conversation. This commonality inhering between the social group and the wine in the glass seems to reinforce social bonds, bringing the group into a deeper level of alcohol-centered intimacy. Customers in small wine bars tend also to be less transient than in other wine and food venues. Somehow this commonality is enhanced by the actual bar itself. A sense of ownership and shared assent develops, and loyalty is the inevitable result. A certain vibe and crowd eventually begins to describe and define the space, attracting similar customers with shared tastes and values. A micro-culture is born.
I cannot think of another kind of venue where these bonds develop to the extent that they do in the small wine bar. Especially in Southern Europe, wine bars define the culture, politics and communal vibe of a people. While regulated by the regional authorities, these centers of communal gathering exclude the authorities and the State by virtue of their nature as centers of grass-roots ad-hoc organizations and social groupings. They offer an escape from the weary and structured day-to-day of life in the age of the Nation-State. Bars and cultural identity are inextricably bound in a mutually creative evolution that is one of the greatest expressions of the primal freedom of the human experience. Small bars are a place of safety, and act as a surrogate womb for so many of us that are looking to escape the days troubles, and to experience camaraderie, free discussion and mutual regard. And catch a little buzz.
