Caretaker's Cottage

Caretaker's Cottage pours from a small heritage cottage at 139-141 Little Lonsdale Street, once home to the caretaker of the church next door, dwarfed by the CBD towers around it. Matt Stirling, Ryan Noreiks, and Rob Libecans opened it quietly in 2022; the World's 50 Best Bars ranked it No. 19 in 2025 and named it the Best Bar in Australasia.

The 50 Best citation gets the order right: two drinks anchor the room, the martini and the Guinness. Time Out Melbourne calls it the tiny titan of the city's cocktail scene.

The Room

The cottage holds a few dozen people across a worn timber bar, a handful of tables, and a small upstairs. It reads as a pub first and a cocktail bar second, which is the trick. Broadsheet notes the owners carry resumes from some of the world's best bars and chose to build something this humble anyway.

The Drinks

Order the house martini, poured bracingly cold from the freezer with a gin the bar had custom made; 50 Best notes it appears regularly on lists of Australia's best cocktails. The smarter order is the boilermaker, that martini beside a pint of Guinness, which 50 Best calls the best in the country. A rotating signature list changes monthly; the June Bug Milk Punch ran coconut rum, banana, melon liqueur, pineapple, and lime.

The Crowd

Industry drinkers and CBD workers hold the afternoon; the room turns over to a younger cocktail crowd after dark. Tripadvisor reviewers single out floor staff who remember first names. Despite being Melbourne's busiest cocktail bar, every guest gets treated like a regular.

The Neighborhood

Little Lonsdale Street sits at the quiet top of the CBD grid, two blocks from Melbourne Central station. Chinatown's bars start three minutes south, and Exhibition Street's cocktail rooms sit within a five minute walk. The cottage makes a natural first stop before a deeper CBD crawl.

When to Go

Mid afternoon on a weekday gives you a stool and a settled pint. Friday and Saturday queues form by early evening; go at opening or late. The monthly menu change lands at the start of each month.

Practical notes: the bar takes no bookings, so build slack into any plan that routes through it. Solo seats at the bar turn over faster than tables. The 2025 awards run, No. 19 in the world and Best Bar in Australasia, has lifted weekend demand noticeably, so weeknights are now the local advice.

What Regulars Say

• Tripadvisor reviewers call it well worth its world ranking and praise staff who make solo drinkers comfortable.
• Concrete Playground describes it as quintessentially Melbourne: cool without pretension, intimate without exclusion.
• Broadsheet flags the wait: the room is small and the city knows it now.

Who It Is For

• Martini drinkers chasing the country's benchmark pour
• Anyone who thinks a great bar should feel like a pub
• Avoid if you need a booking or a big group table

World ranked bars usually announce themselves; this one hides in a cottage and lets the boilermaker argue. Pair it with 1806 down on Exhibition Street for the full CBD cocktail arc.

For the full ranked list, read our guide to the Best Cocktail Bars in Melbourne, or browse every spot in the Melbourne cocktail bars guide.