oronto’s College Strip is as close to nightlife diversity as any restless Torontonian is going to get. A walk from Palmerston Boulevard to, say, Shaw Street shows a range from pre-gentrification Portuguese coffee shops to fusion fantasy restaurants. The crowd in the area mixes everything from the after-school kids and local artists to incognito celebs and V-VIPs. Nightspots are numerous and open late.

In the middle of it all is Wild Indigo, a kooky-cool spot that avoids the pitfalls of some of the area's drinking establishments. It’s enough out of the way that the cap-wearing U of T crowd can’t be bothered, but it’s not a scenester showcase either. Rather, the bar plays host to a low-key crowd escaping the scene, unaware that they’ve created yet one on their own.

A few things that strike most first-timers is the decor (think Keith Partridge’s bedroom) and the unsolicited camaraderie of the place. The latter was echoed recently by a group of off-work Dominion Store clerks who informed us in slurrred English, “There’s no dancing here - so you just chill”. So succinctly put.

She’s right, Wild Indigo is a throwback martini lounge, with no dance floor, no food, and nobody seems to care. Staff and friends lounge, mingle and mix with the amalgamated crowd, making a first timer unsure of who is staff; on an earlier visit, the surfer-type dude lounging at the table beside us jumped up and took our order, suggesting the possibility that he worked there.