The prime real estate on the corner of Xiangyang Lu and Julu Lu, just under Kartel, has been a couple of things recently, including my favorite neighborhood canteen (RIP) and some Cantonese joint that didn't last long. This is what replaced it! Mixlab. It's a cocktail bar. It has Lucky Huang (Union Trading Company, Birds of Paradise) behind the bar, under a giant Bacardi logo, Bacardi championship winning drinks on the menu, and — differentiator! — a front room designed for cocktail-making classes. Make a person to drink, they'll drink for a night. Teach a person to make a drink, and they'll never fish a day in their life. Or something.

This place only just opened a couple weeks ago. They have done a decent enough job with it, if only the bare minimum: industrial decor, light wooden counter top, some lounge seating, some bar stools, and the the requisite chemistry lab that all serious-minded cocktail bars seem to have now, complete with a rotary evaporator quietly spinning away. Food menu with slightly elevated bar snacks, naturally, and a short menu of drinks which go for a uniform 88rmb. Highlighted in a different font color are a trio of Bacardi Legacy championship winning cocktails; 2019's Pink Me Up by Ronnaporn Kanivichaporn from Thailand (trivia, Ronnaporn is the first person to win Legacy while representing a country in Asia; Shingo Gokan was working at Angel's Share in NYC when he won the 2012 edition), 2018's Carino by Erik Van Beek and 2016's Venceremos by Chi-an (Gn) Chan. I asked if they could make a Speak Low, and was told their partnership with Bacardi gives them free reign to use any previous championship winning cocktail, and they planned to include it in the future. So that's cool. If I'm honest though, with a bartender as skilled as Lucky Huang behind the bar and a company as big as Bacardi backing it, it's a little rough around the edges. The backbar was kind of a mess — watching a bartender spend fifteen seconds looking for a bottle doesn't inspire a lot of confidence — and while some drinks (Smoked Salmon Martini and especially Lucky's own Lucky Highball) were great, others were "not there yet." That's the polite way of saying a little crap. The St. Germain came out like dishwater. Mixlab's standout feature happens out front. They have two long tables with drains set up where their bartenders can host cocktail classes. When I was there, they were teaching a stirred mojito with an option of two syrups. You do have to use Bacardi, though. No Havana Club allowed on these premises.

Is this a mixology?

Still, hey. That's cool. More people should learn to make cocktails. Useful party trick, and it helps you appreciate what goes into your drinks elsewhere. Professional cocktail tutorials on Douyin and Bilibili exploded earlier this year as COVID locked everyone out of bars, but nothing beats in-person coaching. Classes are free at the moment (head to the bar to get "invited" to a class), but they'll probably start charging eventually. That's going to make-or-break this: 30rmb to make your own mojito is one thing, but like... 100rmb? Or 200rmb? For something you could pick up from a YouTube tutorial at home? Hard pass. Anyway. Can't get too worked up about this. They're clearly in soft opening, and they have the decency to have a 20% soft opening discount. I can forgive a lot of hiccups and rough edges if a bar has the numerical equivalent of "hey we're working on it" printed on your receipt. Plus 9.9rmb mojitos from June 12-14. (The bartenders will make them for you.)