My Life
I was born in São Paulo, Brazil – but I grew up on a beautiful island called Florianópolis, in the south of Brazil. Life there was all about surfing and being surrounded by nature. When I turned 18, I moved to Australia. The plan was simple: six months of surfing. It turned into ten years.
I didn’t speak English well at the time, so I found my first job in a kitchen washing dishes. Strangely enough, I liked it—the pressure, the energy, the camaraderie. From dishwashing, I moved up to being a kitchen hand, chopping and prepping food. That’s when I heard about Australia’s system for permanent residency. Every year they’d announce a few careers in demand. The year I was eligible, the choices were hairdressing and commercial cookery. I wasn’t about to spend my life in a cold, air-conditioned salon—so I doubled down on the heat and chaos of the kitchen. I enrolled in culinary school and worked in kitchens to pay my way. After graduating I was only 21, but I was already feeling the weight of that path. I looked around and saw unhappy chefs—always stressed, always yelling. That wasn’t for me. I needed more joy in my life, more spontaneity. One day, just after I received my permanent visa, I made a decision that changed everything. I called the casino I worked for and told them I wanted out of the kitchen and into the bar. They warned me I’d start by picking up glassware off the dancefloor. I didn’t care—I just wanted in. So I started from the bottom again: cleaning, stocking fridges, pouring beers. Eventually, I made my first cocktail.
“Bars are like mirrors of society“
Tai Barbin
At the time, I found it frustrating not to move faster. But now I see that working through every single position—from barback to bartender—taught me how the whole machine works. It shaped my understanding of hospitality as a business. I never ask anyone to do a task I haven’t done myself, and I know exactly how much each role demands.
Still, bartending wasn’t my passion. It gave me flexibility, though – and that freedom allowed me to pursue business ideas on the side. I was always drawn to events and marketing. At one point, I even organized the biggest private New Year’s Eve party in Australia. We chartered eight boats and brought nearly 4,000 people to a private island. That was more my thing – creating moments, building experiences.
I also traveled a lot. Back in the day, flights from Australia were so expensive that it was cheaper to buy round-the-world tickets. I took full advantage. I spent time in Ibiza, Japan, Southeast Asia, Europe – you name it. I’d stop, work in bars for a few months, soak up the culture, then move on. Solo travel taught me a lot. If you want to truly understand a culture, sit at a local bar, order a drink, and watch how people interact. Bars are like mirrors of society.
Eventually, I returned to Australia and enrolled in architecture school. I had always loved drawing – I used to paint surfboards and sell them on the beach. Architecture seemed like a natural fit, and I moved to Brisbane to study. To pay for school, I worked weekends in bars, and that’s when I was first exposed to proper, classic cocktails. But… I didn’t finish the degree. I shifted gears into event production and launched my own event company instead. In 2009, I worked on the opening of a massive venue in Brisbane called Cloudland – a super-hyped place that attracted celebrities like Will.i.am. I was lucky to work closely with Iain Griffith, who would later go on to be named one of the world’s top bartenders. That experience exposed me to a higher standard of professionalism. I wasn’t the boss there – I was just one of the team – but I learned fast and eventually became bar manager, then general manager.
Then, in 2012, I opened my first bar: Elixir Rooftop in Brisbane. It was my baby. I designed and built the furniture, created the logo, managed the entire concept, and even designed the uniforms. Elixir was located right next to Chinatown, and I wanted a theme that connected culturally. I chose the name based on a Chinese legend – the story of the rabbit in the moon, crafting elixirs for the immortals. That imagery inspired me. I went a little wild and ordered 328 hand-carved wooden rabbits from China to fill the entire back bar. Everyone thought I was crazy – “It’s going to look like a Playboy bar,” they said. But I stuck with the vision, and it worked. We made the rabbits part of the brand identity. I even turned them into a marketing tool. People could only “buy” a rabbit if they spent over $2,000 on a booking. That campaign exploded – suddenly everyone wanted one, and bookings shot up. It was marketing psychology in action, and I loved it.
I’ve never liked formal education, but I love learning on my own. I taught myself graphic design because I got tired of waiting for designers to tweak a flyer. I’d pour a glass of wine, open YouTube, and just figure it out. That’s how I’ve learned almost everything in life – through curiosity and necessity. Marketing, psychology, design, hospitality – it’s all part of the same puzzle for me. And building Elixir Rooftop was the first time I got to put it all together.
Liz Cocktail & Co.
Everything about my bar Liz Cocktail & Co. is about immersion. It’s not just about cocktails. It’s about creating a space where people can forget. Forget the bills, the deadlines, the phone notifications. Forget the mess. Because most people wake up every day just to solve problems. Life is a to-do list. I want Liz to be a pause button. A place where time slows down. Where people are present. Where yesterday doesn’t matter and tomorrow can wait. Just be here. Feel the lighting, the music, the conversation, the rhythm behind the bar. That’s what I’m building – an emotional space. Almost like a theme park, but for adults who need a break from the noise.
And that’s why the cocktail, for me, is a detail. A very important one. But still – the drinks are just one part of something bigger. So behind Liz Cocktail & Co. there is something more – a why. A reason. A purpose. You don’t have to write it on a wall, but you feel it. In the lighting, in the music, in how the bartender greets you, in the care we put into things most places ignore. And when people say “Rio isn’t ready for this” or “That’ll never work here,” I smile. I’ve heard that in every city I’ve ever lived in. And I’ve made a habit of proving them wrong.
We’ve got five people working here. That’s it. Five. A tiny team. In a 26-square-meter space that seats 100 people. Soon 100. And yes, that’s completely ridiculous. But it works. We make it work. We like making it work.
I did it all: The design, the decoration, the marketing, the HR. I didn’t do it because I’m a control freak (even though maybe I am a little). I did it because I care. I need to love what I do. If I don’t love it, my brain switches off. So the mission was simple: Build the kind of bar I’d want to go to.
So yeah, five years after opening it, we’re still here. we still do cocktails. We still run service like a military ballet. The bar is running strong, the team is tight, and the vibe hasn’t cracked. Honestly, I’ve never stayed this long anywhere. Ten years in Rio. Ten years in a place I once avoided. A place I was warned about, laughed off, even feared. But here I am – not just living in it, but building in it. Co-creating something that didn’t exist before. And I think that’s what keeps me going. I don’t like repeating. If something worked, great – now let’s break it, rebuild it better. I don’t want to be the guy doing a watered-down version of his own success. So the next step is coming. Another place. Another project. We’re already deep into it.
What really struck me after opening Liz, maybe the biggest shift in this journey, is that most of our clients aren’t even from Brazil. They’re from outside. New York, London, Copenhagen. They walk in, they taste, they feel, and they say things like: “Man, we’ve been to 50 Best Bars. And this? You guys are right up there.” And that just… hits. That shit motivates me. Because they say, “If you were in Manhattan, you’d be making a bullshit amount of money.” And maybe they’re right. But I’m not in Manhattan. I’m here. And I’m building something that doesn’t exist there. Something that feels right here. That belongs here.
The city shaped me – but I shaped back. The industry changed me – but I helped change it too. And that weird moment, during carnival, with a guy from the favela telling me I inspired him? That never left. Because it made me ask, “Okay, so now that you have a little attention, what are you going to do with it?” That’s when I stopped thinking about bartending and started thinking about culture: How you make people feel. How you raise the bar for what hospitality even means in a place like Brazil. How you build spaces where people don’t just drink – they feel seen. Spaces where a kid who never imagined himself working in a bar can suddenly picture himself running one. Or owning one.
Why the bar is called Liz Cocktail & Co.? People ask me that a lot. Why “Liz”? Well, I had a partner when I first opened – he was more like a manager. We wanted a name that would break the stereotype. Something that didn’t sound like a place full of sweaty guys watching football and chugging beers. Something feminine. Something softer. At the time, I was engaged. We had talked about having a daughter one day, and we said we’d call her Liz. My partner and his wife? Same story. We laughed and said, “Okay, neither of us is allowed to use Liz for our kid. So let’s use it for the bar. Let this be our daughter.” He had a boy. I didn’t get married. A human Liz? Never came to life. Except she – the bar – did. She’s here and became something. And that’s beautiful.
My personal mixing philosophy
I never believed in perfect cocktails – not in any objective sense, at least. What I believe in is the right cocktail. The one that fits the person, the moment, the mood. So it always starts with reading people. And I don’t mean what they say – I mean what they carry. The energy they walk in with. The silence between their words. If someone just got a raise? That calls for one kind of drink. If their husband cheated on them? That’s a whole different pour entirely.
That’s why I work with the classics. Not because I’m short on ideas – I’ve got plenty – but because those drinks have stood the test of time. They’re not about ego or flair. They’re about balance. Grace. Story.
My job isn’t to impress. It’s to understand. And if I’ve done that right, then the drink does the rest.
Rio de Janeiro Recommendations
The Future
Mixology, I’ve always said, follows gastronomy by a few years. When kitchens went full lab – sous-vide, rotovap, fat-washing – we followed suit behind the bar. Suddenly, cocktails came with more lab equipment than a high school chemistry class. But I believe the pendulum always swings back. The more we push into the hyper-modern, the more people will crave the human, the historical, the real. That’s my bet. That’s where I’m placing all my chips.
It’s why the motto of my bar, printed right on the napkins, is simple: “The simple is real.”
In Brazil, the cocktail scene is still young, it’s still growing. São Paulo is ahead, Rio is coming along. The biggest limitation? Product access, for example due to import regulations we cannot import mezcal and only one kind of bitters is widely available. But this lack, is fuel for creativity. So we make things on our own. But give this country five more years at this pace, and I honestly believe we’ll be side by side with London, NYC, Singapore. That’s the future I see. But for that to happen, we need to build culture. And culture doesn’t grow in isolation. So I don’t see other bars as competition – I see them as collaborators. The more good bars, the better for all of us. We’re sharing the same 5% of the market right now. Let’s grow that!
Profile
Born: 1985
Superpower: Curiosity. I want to know everything – finance, cocktails, Swiss politics if you’ve got the time.
Free Time: Surfing
Bartender since: 2009
Biggest fail: Lack of patience
Most significant career step: Moving to Rio and committing fully to bartending.
Favorite bar: Grand Army in Brooklyn NYC. If I could only go to one bar for the rest of my life, that’s the one.
Favorite drink: I like dense cocktails you drink and have time to think about life. I’m a rum guy, always have been. One of my favorite recent creations is a twist on Coffee and Cigarettes, originally from Death & Co. Mine uses aged rum as the base – deep, warm, familiar. Then just a dash of peated whisky to bring in that smoky “cigarette” note. Add coffee liqueur, chocolate bitters, and a touch of purple bitters for something unexpected – something floral, almost melancholic.
Images: ©Liz Cocktails & Co.
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