At lunch, when you can sit on the patio and look up the Yonge and Bloor buildings, it's an oasis on Cumberland. At night, when people in shades are still in work clothes and guzzling beer, it's like an opium den for the white-collar crowd, not copping too much attitude under the nonjudgmental stare of the young, energetic staff.

'Most of our staff is in their early 20's, says Owner Al Stuart. 'And, it's funny, as they'll inevitably tell me that their parents came here when they were the same age.'

Stuart himself snuck into the bar when he was still in Jarvis Collegiate. Afternoons would be spent here with his group of school buddies, occasionally joking about coming back and buying the place.

It wouldn't be until the late '80s, when Stuart and his buddies (still keeping contact through hockey practice) would discover that their school-days haunt was up for sale. Stuart, Chuck Higgins and eight other grade-school friends - who had all went different ways professionally - wasted no time in buying The Pilot. Suddenly a bar owner and operator, Stuart knew that to lure that upper-Yorkville crowd, he must first seduce them with a rooftop patio; a judgment call was soon made to add the Flight Deck.