Take Flight at HJU:Z Lounge

Here’s a piece of YVR history you may not know: legendary billionaire movie director and aviator Howard Hughes loved our fair city so much, he made the Westin Bayshore Hotel a temporary home. Pretty neat, huh? Even neater is the fact you can now enjoy a Hughes-inspired cocktail at the brand-new HJU:Z Lounge, located inside the Vancouver hotel he loved most.

Prepped in secret for months, the ground-floor lobby-facing space is all Art Deco and Hollywood glam—truly, not one detail has been overlooked. The lounge is decked out in plush dusty pink and powder-blue velvet banquettes, chic black-and-white cube mosaic tiles and Jitterbug-worthy parquet wood floors. There are giant brushed-gold fixtures inspired by propellors, aviation-inspired coasters, and look up, way up, to admire a custom-made-in-Czechoslovakia chandelier meant to mimic action in the wind. Slide up to the sparkling white-marble bar and order from a variety of cool, crisp, sweet and sour cocktails reflecting stops made by Hughes on his record-breaking 1938 flight ’round the world (try all seven to unlock a secret eighth drink). On the menu: elaborate creations by chef Alex Mok, including a 28-day-aged coffee-crusted Caifornia-cut striploin steak (one of Hughes’ favourite meals), baked New Zealand abalone with Vancouver Island-sourced seaweed, served-in-the-shell scrambled duck egg topped with Northern Divine caviar and, for dessert, a "floating island" of meringue and crème anglaise. There’s also entertainment: live music, five nights a week.

While fine flying weather may be hard to predict, we’re certain Hughes would have approved of his namesake lounge. —Aurea Dempsey and Noa Nichol

HJU:Z Lounge, 1601 Bayshore Dr., Vancouver, 604-682-3377, hjuzlounge.com