A two-decade veteran of Tacoma’s craft cocktail scene is turning a vacant storefront in the Stadium District into what he calls an imaginary beach bar. Chris Keil plans to open Kokovoko this fall inside the ground floor of Stadium Apartments at 705 N. 1st St., a space named for the fictional home island of the harpooner Queequeg in Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick.
The name comes straight from the 1851 novel, where Melville describes Kokovoko in Chapter 12 as an island far away to the West and South that is not down in any map, since true places never are, according to the text preserved on Wikisource. As reported by the Tacoma News Tribune, Keil first helped develop the Kokovoko concept while working at En Rama, before that Courthouse Square bar changed hands in 2024. Keil is a Tacoma native who has been crafting drinks in the city for about two decades, with earlier stints at 1022 South J and Hilltop Kitchen shaping his approach.
From Apothecary Bitters to Beach Cocktails
Keil’s résumé traces a long arc through Tacoma nightlife. His early bar 1022 South J earned a nod from The New York Times in 2011, which praised it for producing some of the most fascinating apothecary cocktail work on the West Coast, according to Seattle magazine. The bar was known for custom tinctures, house-made mixers and apothecary cups. When he opened Hilltop Kitchen in 2013, Keil built the drink program around Latin American spirits like mezcal and cachaça, pairing them with Northwest-influenced Latin street food, per Seattle Met.
He later opened En Rama. The News Tribune’s report notes that the Kokovoko idea itself first took shape during Keil’s time at En Rama, years before it found a permanent home.
Proof Serves as the Testing Ground
Keil’s current bar, Proof, is an Old Town cocktail lounge. Located at 2312 N. 30th St., Proof is where the Kokovoko team is dialing in recipes Tuesday through Saturday ahead of the fall opening, the News Tribune reports, with rotating cover nights on Thursdays. Brandi Dickerson is serving as Kokovoko’s bar lead as the menu comes together, per the same account, and Keil says he’s still formulating exactly what will land on the final list…