The Retreat

Nice place to go with your group but it’s not a place you go by yourself. Food is ok but too expensive. Good atmosphere usually and the best place to see live music in the area. Depending on what you’re seeking, could be a great or mediocre time.

Random venue! Half old man’s local, half hipster hangout. The beer garden is the place to be! Decent selection of beers, standard, reasonably priced pub food, live music. Bit quirky with the no EFTPOS outside and the unisex toilet, but a good mixed crowd. Wait service is pretty shabby (no cutlery delivered for example) but they told us 45 minute wait and it was like 10. Give it a crack! Just be sure to explore before choosing where to sit. In summer head straight to the back!

I’d heard about this place but had never been. It’s a pretty huge venue and upon first entering it’s a little hard to know where you’re supposed to be. On Sundays, and at least at the time of writing this, Vince peach will make your Sunday a fun one, spinning vinyls and soul 45’s from 2−7pm. You now know where to go for a through dance on Sunday afternoon. Kicking on after that is Kylie auldist and her soul band. If that doesn’t get you moving nothing will.
Aside form this the retreat itself is a pretty solid pub to visit anytime; Food qaulity is great, particularly on the burger/​slider side of things, there’s usually some great beverage on and off tap, and it’s a great way to relax.

Really ace beer garden in a fantastic pub/​venue in Brunswick!
Retreat has a really decent/​extensive food menu, and is a great spot for dinner or drinks with friends. Heaps of room, frequent live music, a pool table and basically everything you could want from a bar.
Well worth a visit on nice evening, and great for groups. Thumbs up.

Alright, lets talk Sydney Rd.
So you’re kind of spoilt for a bit of choice along the strip these days with the Cornish Arms, The Penny Black, The Mess, Spotted Mallard, and Howler about. However, you can’t escape the fact that dancing to Roxanne at 1am at the Retreat is anything less than drunken perfection.
Its a pub pub, so don’t fool your dainty little selves that the bathrooms are going to be spotless and the beer garden isn’t going to be loud and rowdy on a Friday/​Saturday night. Heck I wouldn’t expect anyone that hasn’t lived in Brunswick or at least crashed there a few times to truly understand the drawing power of The Retreat.
Pub food
Pub music
Pub people.
Simple and local, a little bit rough but it sure are hell beats the cookie cutter environment of Bridie O’Reilly’s. Sorry Bridie.

Is it bad to judge a place based on its bathroom alone?
The main bathroom by the bar is a unisex bathroom. This didn’t bother me in theory… and then I went in. Suffice it to say, one of the guys coming out saw my face and said, «you know there’s a women’s only bathroom in the back? It can be a bit rough in here sometimes.» Which only makes me wonder what my facial expression must have looked like.
Other than that, pints were about $ 10 and jugs were $ 20, which is about average, but I wish they’d had a better beer selection. There was a live band which was decent, but overall I wouldn’t return here, given that there are so many other cool bars on this strip of Sydney Road.

As I said in my review of Bar Open, «Its hard to be objective when reviewing pubs, because the whole experience one has there is a totally subjective one. For example, if you have a great night with your friends, beat everyone at pool and go home with a supermodel then you see the pub in a positive light, whereas if the pub is half empty and nobody talks to you and you leave after half an hour, you hate the place forever. But here goes…»
The Retreat Hotel is my favourite pub and I believe that it is actually the best pub in Melbourne — and Im speaking objectively here:
The major huge asset of the Retreat is that it simply caters for everyone, because there is just so much to do there and it is not overrun with one single type of person — for example you will never find a night when everyone is a goth or everyone is a footy head or everyone is a punk etc. What you will find most nights are a mixture of people ranging from funky Brunswick locals, suburbanites coming in from miles away, bucks nights, hens nights, live music fans, drag queens, old bar flies who like playing pool, drunks, people who dont go out much and people who live every weekend as if it is their last. Somehow or another, all of these people seem to be able to get along well enough with each other to make a great pub — and remember, the pub is not just the building — the pub is the people who go into the building and create the energy!
The front of the pub has a front bar section and some other little pockets with booths where people can sit and chat in an environment where is becomes very easy to talk with their neighbours.
The middle section has a pool table, an ATM, various pinball type machines and a large eating area which turns into a dance floor after the kitchen closes. The kitchen provides good meals at a reasonable price. The meals include chicken parmagiana and usual pub food as well as a few more exotic dishes. Sometimes there is live music and the pub is popular with the local music scene. After the bands finish, there is a dj and they usually play music that most people actually know!!!
But the best part of the pub is the enormous beer garden! I cant ever remember a better beer garden in a pub ANYWHERE — and Ive been to 45 countries!!! The beer garden has an enormous tree in the middle and just has a lovely leafy feel to it! It is great in the afternoon but retains its flavour way into the early hours of the morning! They run a bbq in the beer garden too, selling sausages and burgers and this continues after the actual kitchen has closed for the night.
Another great thing about the pub is the staff. The owner obviously knows what they are doing, because they simply havnt changed anything. Far too often, pub owners great greedy when their pub is doing well and start changing things and thus ruin their pub in the process. However the owner of the Retreat obviously understands that what has worked so far to make the pub a great pub is still working and thus there is no need to change a winning formula!
The bar staff are friendly despite having to work hard and the security guards are friendly and professional. They rarely kick people out and if they have to, they do it in a reasonable and professional manner.
The other thing I like is that while the pub is a popular nighttime venue, it is also a great place to just hang out in the afternoon — particularly the beer garden and the front tables!
Of course not every single night you spend at the Retreat is going to be the best night of your life, but all in all, it is a very good pub and if you give it a chance Im pretty sure you will have a good night there soon enough! If you havnt enjoyed yourself the first night you have been there then I will buy you a beer if Im there the second night you go!

Friend of mine had a residency at the Retreat, a year or two back. He’d perform every week. And that, right there, is both the benefit and the risk of dropping by the Retreat. They make an effort to reach out to local musicians, to get live music in. So you might drop by for a quiet beer with friends, and it might be the start of an affair with an up-​and-​coming folk trio. On the other hand, you might order one of their large burgers only to be belted with some bad indie soft rock. It’s a two-​edged sword
So, it’s just as well they’ve got a lovely, spacious beergarden outside then, isnt it? And it is a nice beergarden — the only issue being that seats can often be hard to find.
On the whole, the food and the atmosphere at the Retreat are well worth the attendant risk of bad music being thrown at you.
Most of the time.

This place is the oldest Hotel in Brunswick — servicing the thirsty and hungry for well over 120 years. On a prominent site on Sydney road, this place can get super busy on the weekends and does pretty well on weekdays too.
There is live music in the main room most nights and the weekends bring DJ’s as well. The food is stock standard and they do a pretty good vege burger. I had mine sitting in the biggest beer garden on the planet — ok slight exaggeration!
Out the back there are heaps of tables that you can gather a small posse to fill. There are huge trees and an odd artificial lawn. There are also a couple of alcoves to keep it interesting.
Back inside after the dinner service has finished, the tables are moved away to let the crowds dance up a storm. If dancing isn’t your thing you can test your skills on the pool table or nestle in to the front bar for a pot and a good chinwag.
The staff are kept busy and aren’t there to be your friends, but are courteous enough and seem pretty chilled.

I have a funny relationship with this pub. I can see why people like it, I want to like it, I’ve tried to like it but I just can’t.
The is quintessential Brunswick. Quirky crowd, quirky and funky bar staff, great beer garden and plenty of live music but somehow the sum of it’s parts is less than it should be.
The live music can be a bit confronting if you’re mildly susceptible to being offended by swearing or shall we say ‘adult’ themes. The first night I went there was a massive downer as the band were getting all emo and melancholy which sucked the life out of the room. The next time I went was the polar opposite, a couple of dudes who were great and played tunes with original lyrics and it was pretty good — until they finished.
A lot of people love it here, including most of my friends, but I just can’t get into it. If you like Brunswick, give it a go, you’ll probably love it — i wish I did.

Came here with a bunch of friends one Sunday afternoon after we’d finished up our garage sale, and the beer garden was in full swing, which made for a lovely vibe, but my goodness was it noisy.
There were loads a kids running around on the fake grass, falling over, screaming, crying, that sort of thing. I didn’t mind all that too much, it was the music that intruded on the conversations. We might just have been unlucky to have been sitting right under some very large speakers, but the music blaring out too near to our ears plus the kids meant that talking, or rather listening, was a bit stressful.
The food was good though. Nothing fancy, just your straight up pub grub, served large and hot, and well priced. I had fish and chips — batter was light and crisp, and the chips were a winner. Boags on tap quenched my thirst, and a dash of Stone’s ginger wine added made it the perfect drink that afternoon.

A dining area takes up the centre and back of the building, complete with good kitchen of good food — full-​fledged meals to the snack variety nachos, bowl of veggies, chips etc. — and band area. Music can be found four nights a week, usually softer acts starting during actual dinner time and the night and the sounds getting underway as the kitchen closes. For those wanting to avoid the band, lounge area is to the front of the venue, with couches and booth style areas, along with tables taking up the street frontage. The outside holds a wicked beer garden, complete with patch of real fake grass in the centre.
The beer is good; one bar serves all three areas so the crowds can get in the way for those waiting in line. And as for lines, Saturday nights usually have a line out the front of the building, stretching down the tram stop on the corner.
Monday nights with Mexican specials!