"I don't think it's just a gap in Wynwood. I think it's a gap in hospitality overall," says Keith Paciello, co-owner of LunaSol and previously a partner at Rokbar and Bella Rose on South Beach. "I think places are run very commercially and very just money-driven, and there's no personality. There's no true hospitality anymore."
LunaSol, opening its doors in Wynwood tonight, April 4, will function partly as a cocktail lounge and partly as a nightclub. The front end of the house will operate Tuesday through Saturday from 5 to 11 p.m., with the club open Friday and Saturday after 10 p.m.
"I think Wynwood has the most energy right now. I think South Beach really doesn't have the foot traffic, it doesn't have the energy it used to have," Paciello says. "I see Wynwood like Miami in the 2000s — there's a lot more happening. All the best restaurants are coming here, and it's really vibrant. But there's really no upscale place, like no curated party."
LunaSol's other two owners — Derek Gonzalez, founder of Goat Hospitality Group, and Ryan Van Milligen, former director of the Opium Group — are of similar minds.
"I mean, really, the backbone of what Miami nightlife was — and the hospitality sector in the city — was based on personalities and people," he said. "All interacting in a similar, like-minded set, where people are able to let loose, have a good time, enjoy themselves, and really feel like they're in somebody's home," Van Milligen says.
"It's really building that soul and that community, letting people have a great time and appreciate what you can offer them," says Van Milligen.
LunaSol photo
A Genuine Nightlife Escape
Van Milligen wants the experience to feel more authentic than what's typically on offer in the Miami nightlife scene. Ideally, LunaSol will be about more than just "rotating people in and out to make your numbers.""It's really building that soul and that community, letting people have a great time and appreciate what you can offer them," he adds. "They really value that. And I think that it's been lacking in the city, and this is really what made Miami great for a very long time, and I think a lot of people are craving that."
It's disheartening, Van Milligen adds, when people come to him looking for recommendations, only for him to come up empty.
"You don't have those answers because you don't know where to send them, because they don't, you don't think they're going to enjoy what they have to offer," he says.
Paciello, above all else, wants the experience of going out to come across as altogether more genuine. He says his focus is on providing people with opportunities to build community.
"When people say, 'I met my wife,' or, 'I met my husband there.' Like, those are the things that make me happy," Paciello says. "Those are the best times in my life, you know. And we just want to keep those best times going, you know?"
And barring making any lifelong connections, Gonzalez adds that the owners intend, at minimum, to provide attendees with the opportunity to shed their familiar skins — if only for a night.
"Inside, you forget that, man, I'm in Miami, let alone Wynwood, right?" Gonzalez says. "It's really about just creating that delivery of that product for everyone. It's really not a certain demographic, like, 'We only want these types of people to come here.' We want everyone to come here."
LunaSol. 158 NW 24th St., Miami; 786-805-4927; lunasol-miami.com.
