At 12:03 a.m., as the DJ hits his stride and the disco ball refracts red glimmers across leopard-print footstools and burgundy banquettes, a plate of just-baked chocolate chip cookies emerges. They’re presented with a flourish by Mit Amin and gratefully received by the finely frocked revelers who find themselves here in the wee hours. It’s a grandmotherly gesture in a room otherwise pulsing with bass, sultriness, and a healthy dose of hedonism.
Mary Lou’s, the velvet-roped cocktail lounge and club tucked inside the former Berto’s Bait & Tackle at the corner of Southern Boulevard and South Olive Avenue in West Palm Beach, is an of-the-times ode to golden-era Palm Beach. It also happens to be the area’s most talked-about after-hours address since its opening in January 2025. According to its founders, it was never meant to be just another nightclub.
“We’re in the business of making memories,” says CEO Alex Melillo, whose late grandmother was the namesake Mary Lou. “The greatest form of art is joy—being able to make people smile, enjoy, and lose themselves in the moment.”
Melillo, Joe Cervasio, and Topher Grubb are the partners and visionaries behind Mary Lou’s and its parent company, Mama Hospitality. Their backgrounds in nightlife, luxury hospitality, and large-scale event production overlap as if fated, and maybe it all was.
Cervasio and Melillo grew up together on Long Island, best friends since second grade. Melillo’s grandmother lived in Palm Beach, so he spent holidays here and visited often. Melillo knew Grubb through New York’s hospitality scene. Grubb’s younger sister, Dottie, eventually married Cervasio in 2017, and the couple are now raising their 3-year-old daughter together in Grubb’s hometown of Wellington…