7 years ago, my sister recommended me to go to a board games bar. By that time, I only knew bars bored me, because you sit, you drink, you try to chat in a noisy environment and cover the blanks of a discussion that are never really blank, paradoxically due to this permanent white noise. In other words, bars have no pretext to gather, they are just this 3rd place where people usually meet. They push people to talk to each other. I don’t pretend to be a moralist, but, honestly, how often have you stated that hanging out at that bar was so cool, actually feeling deep in yourself that something was missing, without ever formulating it.

This was life 20 years ago. Since then, concept bars like speak-easy have popped, but it sort of felt like they followed the contemporary art trend, praising minimalism as a beacon of mindfulness. No, the bar you would want to go to regardless of your small talk energy needed a stronger differentiation. Nowadays, they are reaching an apex, new establishments appearing at a rhythm never matched before. Board Game Bars became this missing place where you can have fun independently from your social energy. Yet, this advantage does not quite sum up this new trend, which also relies a lot on immersion through art. One may not think of board game bars as an artistic place. Paradoxically, this suggests that art succeeded there, being fully integrated to its environment, its spirit, and echoing the player’s ethos. Board Game bars that fully play the card of immersion become sort of undercover museums where artworks, instead of hanging aligned on white walls, contribute to the elaboration of a coherent aura, leading to the feeling of entering somewhere, of entering an oneiric home.

7 years ago, for the first time, I had a sense that I had discovered such a place out there that could be my second home, le K-Fée des Jeux, in Grenoble. I always saluted the old and dusty Daredevil, a dog with such long hair I used to nickname it serpillère (mop), which always greeted me from his narrow corner in front of the bar, staring at me with brilliant charcoal pupils. In such a place you don’t drink casual drinks. No. You drink beverages. And it’s more than just a matter of semantics. There, I drank dragon blood, a syrup derivative. I crawled among the assaulted tables, often to satisfy myself with the narrow underground space located under the stairs, watching out for my head. But there, comfort is a bonus. You could tell by its attractiveness. It was such a success that 6 years ago, they opened an extension and started a restaurant activity. At any time, I remember this bar as gloriously decorated. Paintings, drawings, figurines, plants, false spider webs, mirrors… it felt like, regarding indoor style, the budget was illimited. Most of all, it really felt like all of this was made with heart, passion, dedication and all the sweat that comes along. Ultimately, this is the kind of aspect that differentiates the casual establishment from the reputed and mythic one. Thus, in the long run, it happens to be a winning investment.

To that day, I owe some of my great memories to this place.

The board game bars’ park is catching on all over the country, especially in Nantes. Meanwhile, this trend largely remains underdocumented! So the time has come to question it: how are board game bars becoming this 3rd place that achieves to combine art and popularity? First, let’s start with an overview of the board game bars in Nantes and compare them with some in Grenoble and Paris. Then, let’s try to analyse more thoroughly the correlation between art and popularity in such places.

You can probably count Nantes board game bars on your 2 hands’ fingers. Within this number, 3 categories are to be distinguished: casual bars with a few games, concept bars with a peripheral board game side and authentic board game bars.

The 1st category includes the Do It bar, in Chantenay. From the street you can see a few dozens of games, presumably meant to diversify the clientele.

The 2nd category includes the Atomic’s Café, in the city-centre and the Game Over bar. The first one has a room dedicated to comics whereas the second one differentiates itself with video games.

The 3rd category includes La Fabrik à Jeux (2013), La taverne des aventuriers (2024) and L’indécis (2024). The first one would be the industrious bar, functioning on a basis of one consumption per hour. The second one would be the design bar, counting on story-telling to sell, and the last one would be the chill one.

Those board game bars of different categories do more than waiting for players to grab a game on their shelves. They tease and drain them by organising events, like game presentation, prototypal game testing, role game nights, blindtests, quizzes, costume contests, figurine painting sessions… This dynamism, combined with the augmentation of this type of establishments, leads to an emulation beneficial to the sector as long as the demand keeps growing.

As one can guess, board game bar tenders do not sleep on a stack of gold, unlike Smaug. Those bars tend to be as accessible as the regular ones, but some try to innovate in order to be financially more sustainable. The hourly consumption is a reasonable solution for a bar as popular as La Fabrik à Jeux, but it could hinder its reputation in the long-run by contributing to a bad feeling of being overwatch. On the contrary, La taverne des aventuriers opted for customer engagement in order to normalise high expenses. The monthly mocktail contest epitomises this strategy. It consists in opposing two original beverages: the most consumed one remains the following month, while the losing one is replaced. It works because this duel is represented on a dedicated menu card, with fine pictures and hand-made drawings, which lead customers to pass over the €6,50 price. In Grenoble, the K-fée des Jeux diversified its products by obtaining a licence 4 to function as a restaurant. In Paris, board game bars like Le Nid or Les grands gamins demand an entry price of €5.

Once this pricing strategy is established, comes the identity challenge. A natural law seems to stem from board game bars observation: the more immersive, the more reputed. Following this intuition, L’indécis has already made 3 artistic collaborations: @poloarts (fantasy drawings), Tohehaka (patterns linocut) and Harold H. (conceptual drawings). La taverne des aventuriers hand-make their decorations and change them every 2 months. Additionally, they exhibit the hand-sewed clothes of La fée vagabonde, insisting on the intent to collaborate only with local artists.

The limit between art and decoration appears to be really thin within those places. Probably because artworks belong there, they are part of the decor, they contribute to a coherent atmosphere. When board game bars were scarce, you would go to the one that offers the content you expect, like La Fabrik à Jeux. Nevertheless, since new ones have popped really close to each other, the form now holds a greater impact on attractivity. You wouldn’t remember La taverne des aventuriers only for the games you played and the chats you had in there. Instead, those souvenirs conjure up a whole atmosphere around them, as if they were folded into a thick blanket. For this very reason, they will forever be remembered in a singular way, definitively distinguishing this topos from any other within the map of your recollections.

In a nutshell, board game bars are popular because they are accessible, affordable and enjoyable for most people. Their progressive settling in the concept-bar landscape reaches a golden age full of promises largely supported by the hard-working, impassioned, nerdy, heart-felt efforts made to create a memorable atmosphere thanks to decorative art among the most motivated establishments. Those are the ones making of board game bars the trendy 3rd place of the middle of the XXI° century, bringing the concept to another level, a level where those businesses become sustainable thanks to impressions, immersion, and reputation. Ultimately, board game bars remind us that when art feels at home, it looks like decoration.

Written by Paul Rocabois

Sources:

• Instagram / Facebook accounts of quoted board game bars and artist collaborators
• https://feevagabonde.fr/