At any cocktail bar, the centerpiece is undoubtedly the bar counter: it defines the space as a 'bar' that serves booze. This long, elevated surface serves the purpose of not just serving drinks to customers (standing or sitting), but also a space for conversation between both sides of the counter. The bar counter seems so natural that it’s easy to assume it has always existed. In reality, it emerged in the 19th century alongside another important development in drinking cultu

There’s a persistent myth in Southeast Asia that “women didn’t really drink back then.” That cocktails are a modern invention. History says otherwise. If you leaf through newspapers, memoirs, advertisements, and society columns from interwar Malaya, you’ll find women drinking – sometimes discreetly, sometimes defiantly, often stylishly – as early as the 1920s. Not just sipping sherry in the corner, but attending cocktail parties, hosting pahit parties, and eventually being j