THE UNDERFRONT Restauranter

brings boutique cocktail bar concept to Wilmington

The Port City has asserted itself as an entrepreneurial haven for up-and-coming businesses in recent years, and fresh, new vibes are certainly owing along the Cape Fear River.

From Wilmington’s Brooklyn Arts District to the Cargo District to the emerging Soda Pop District, downtown Wilmington and its surrounding neighborhoods are undergoing a true transformation. For the past five years restauranter Joseph Sena has grown the northern side of the Downtown District with his collection of bars and eateries, and he’s now furthering this renovation with his boutique cocktail bar concept, The Underfront.

With a history in the food and beverage industry dating back nearly 30 years, Sena has a great deal of experience when it comes to opening and running bars and restaurants. After college he worked as both general manager and chef of several different establishments in Greensboro, as well as owner Churchill Cigar Bar. When he and wife Abigail moved to Wilmington in 2017, they partnered with friend Ivan “Chip” Moore to open Whiskey Tango Foxtrot in downtown

We got to the point where we were modifying drinks from a culinary side instead of just a spirits side, and it gave me this desire to do a di erent type of cocktail bar where I was really playing on the taste of a chef as opposed to a mixology perspective.

~ JOSEPH SENA

Wilmington. The first of what would become several joint ventures together, the trio took on all the renovations themselves, from initial construction to general build and design. They decided on an old-school, speakeasy style for the bar and embarked on their first true foray into the world of classic cocktails. Soon, however, Sena’s previous experience as a chef left him wanting to dive back into the culinary scene, so his team sold the bar and opened the globally inspired southern food restaurant Rumcow.

“The intersection of the culinary world and the cocktail world was the coolest thing to me,” says Sena. “We got to the point where we were modifying drinks from a culinary side instead of just a spirits side, and it gave me this desire to do a different type of cocktail bar where I was really playing on the taste of a chef as opposed to a mixology perspective.”

After the birth of Sena’s daughter, he and Moore decided to once again change things up, selling both Rumcow and their other neighboring restaurant along Grace Street, Tacobaby. Although they planned to semi-retire, the partners soon began brainstorming new business ideas when they saw that one of the centuries-old buildings along Front Street had come on the market.

“What we’d done with our other restaurants and bar was really develop the north side of downtown Wilmington, and so our idea was to take this side of town that had been overlooked and neglected and make it the new downtown,” says Sena. “Over the years it’s been a point of pride how we’ve slowly ebbed the ow of tra c from the center of downtown and diverted a good upstanding clientele base to the north side with our businesses.”

Situated catty-corner from his previous restaurants, the building Sena chose for his new cocktail bar The Underfront t his vision perfectly. Concealed beneath the 200 block of North Front Street, the subterranean basement bar with a leveled-out patio in the back is rich with authentic board and beam structures, heart pine header boards and exposed brick walls.

“It’s a modern juxtaposition,” says Sena. “The way we renovated it is what I’d consider to be an art deco style bar that juts out in the middle of this rustic landscape of traditional construction of early 1900’s America.”

As for the vision for The Underfront’s o erings, Sena says he, Abigail and Moore took their time and created something di erent, not tying them- selves to traditional builds on cocktails or garnishes.

“We do all the things I knew how to do from a kitchen perspective and apply them to cocktails so we could make avors that are di erent but combined in familiar ways,” he says. “The premise of the bar is to be playful, try things that are unique and approach it all from a new angle as opposed to just inside the box.”

Patrons can select from 40 cra cocktails, 12 local dra s, 25 North Carolina beers, 15 wines by the glass and several non-alcoholic cocktails.

The Underfront also o ers ve di erent charcuterie plates of meats, cheeses and antipasti to complement their avorful cocktail selection.

“One thing about our cocktail list that’s di erent is that it’s a progressive list in body and taste,” says Sena. “We tackle cocktails the way you tackle wine, with a progression of avors.

You start with the lightest cocktails, the fresh and fruity, and inside the section it builds in intensity, then you go on to bitter and herbal, bold and smokey, nice and spicey, and digestif and co ee.”

Sena says his bar doesn’t rely on traditional methods when building cocktails, and at any given time is making two to three di erent housemade bitters, so that all drinks are customized from the ground up. Four cocktails on the menu are fat washed spirits (a process that uses a direct protein or oil-based avor) including a sesame washed gin, bacon washed bourbon, duck fat washed rye, and coconut fat washed rum.

“We take the whole avor and build the drink individually so that it has a satisfying palate as opposed to just cranking out an Old Fashioned,” he says.

In the kitchen, Sena likes to be playful, creating innovative garnishes such as lychee boba balls and ginger candy to go along with his cocktails.

“I think people drink and eat with their eyes, so I’ll go to no ends to nd garnishes that are not only appropriate but beautiful,” says Sena. “We’re running four di erent types of edible owers at the moment and making three di erent boba balls, so anything I can think of to do that will enhance the taste and quality of the drink, we do. There’s not really an end of what we’re willing to try.”

As for the future, Sena plans to add a 700 square-foot tiki bar on the back patio, complete with specialty cocktails geared towards all things tiki and sum- mer. The Underfront will o er weekly live music, swing and salsa dance classes, comedy shows and DJ “retro rewind” nights. He and his partners are looking forward to what’s to come and are proud of the stand-alone atmosphere they’ve helped create along downtown’s northern end.

“I think we’ve made an environment that I’m collectively calling the ‘Cocktail District’ of Wilmington,” says Sena. “I’m excited to see more development on the north end of Front Street and to be a part of a new community of downtown.”