Maybe it’s best to start at the front door. So there, where you have to pass one way or another and in front of which a group of four young men is sitting on this cold, wet Saturday evening. Type: mullet, baggy pants, silver chains around arm and neck. They look like they’re going to party later. But that’s just speculation, now the boys all have a light meal ahead of them. If you open the door and go in, you are stopped by an older gentleman in a light brown coat. He takes off his hat and, yes, actually, he salutes. The lady, the gentleman, welcome.
A lot has already been said about Juliet’s Stüberl, a bar very close to Hohenzollernplatz in Schwabing. At least across the range of the audience – those who are practically part of the bar’s inventory in terms of frequency of visits and demeanor, and those who only occasionally stop by the Stüberl on the quiet Clemensstrasse. In the summer, chess is sometimes played here at the tables in the Schanigarten, and most recently you could watch the Rugby World Cup inside the bar.
Juliet Cox, the namesake and owner, says, “This is my baby.” Next spring she will celebrate her five-year anniversary with her Stüberl. With the wood-panelled walls, the benches and the rest of the furniture, which was apparently already in use during the times of the previous bar, Wolfgang Ettlich’s “Neukölln”, it could also be the 15th or 25th anniversary.
Juliet Cox has made her dream come true with the bar.
(Photo: Stephan Rumpf)
The decorative objects on the wall are excluded: a mask, a vuvuzela, a “Don’t you want to discover Africa” poster with a Hemingway quote. This is not Neukölln, this is – to put it somewhat generally – Africa, maybe it’s kitsch. In any case, it’s a small, personal touch that the owner has added here: Cox comes from Nigeria and has lived in Europe for several decades. First in Belgium, now in Germany. If you didn’t know better, you could mistake the guest room for the hobby room of a frequent traveler.
Parts of the furniture seem to come from the previous bar – but not the decorative objects.
(Photo: Stephan Rumpf)
And maybe that’s the beauty of this bar: that it doesn’t want to be anything more than what it is. Not a club under the guise of a bar; not a place where you go to share Instagram-worthy pictures on the internet afterwards, nor is it a student-run bar, as there are in abundance not even two kilometers further east on Münchner Freiheit. Juliet’s Stüberl, says Cox, is a “place for everyone, young and old, from the neighborhood and from far away.”
The menu also includes the trendy gin and tonic, and there are two types of gin to choose from (8.10 and 9.80 euros). But people tend to order light beer (Maierbräu, 3.90 euros for half), white wine spritzer (a quarter liter for 3.30 euros) or eggnog (3.10 euros for 2 cl). As a rule, Cox has something to eat on offer, mostly hearty home cooking: currywurst, meat patties, chili con carne. And jollof rice.
She has wanted to run a place like this for a long time, says Juliet Cox, who previously worked in the catering industry. When the opportunity presented itself, she jumped at it. She has created a place that feels like it has always been here. A place that doesn’t want to fit into the smoothly groomed and well-licked Schwabing, but which derives its very own charm from it. Lion motif tablecloths included.
Juliet’s Stüberl, Clemensstraße 82, 80796 Munich, opening hours: Sunday to Thursday 3:30 p.m. to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday 3:30 p.m. to midnight.