Is it me, or has the hidey-hole laneway bar been done to death in Melbourne? I applaud people for creatively using space in the CBD but it seems these days that bars get a good billing simply for being difficult to find. Where are the new ideas?

Sister Bella is the brainchild of the same crew who brought us the grungy St Jeromes. Some ideas are carried over: cheap drinks ($4 for Coopers Premium Lager), casual vibe, young and suitably ‘alternative’ staff, and eclectic music. Bella, though, aspires to be a little bit more grown up. Spread out over two levels, the leather chairs, ornate frames, fancy tiles and tealight candles hint at sophistication, while lashings of pine panelling, quirky religious iconography, and a rickety stairwell are geared towards maintaining street cred.

However, it all feels a bit contrived. Jeromes was naturally happening by virtue of its reclaimed concrete space. Whilst Bella is indeed difficult to find, it seems the owners are trying to push the shabby-chic envelope a little too hard, especially since this idea has already been done in more established places like Troika and Rue Bebelons. Granted it’s early days, with sawdust still fresh in the unisex toilet cubicles, and we did visit on a quiet Tuesday evening. With time and more crowd buzz, it may become, as Threethousand enthuses, “too awesome”. I did like the Virgin Mary statuette near the toilets and the seating poofs with innards of synthetic grass. However, I thought that such a space needed fresh ideas. Maybe I’m just getting too old.