Stephen Umpleby (centre) with his staff from new Wollongong bar and restaurant Dreams on Crown. Photos: Supplied.
It was a rough start for Wollongong’s new Dreams on Crown Bar and Restaurant after losing its chef 24 hours before opening, but it didn’t deter owner Stephen Umpleby from continuing with his long-held vision of launching the business.
Officially opening on 19 July, Stephen said it offered a menu of snacks to pub classics, cocktails and Friday and Saturday night live music and DJ entertainment, having learned his trade in nightclubs around Sydney in the early 1990s.
“Over the last three weeks of setting everything up, I felt like Rocky Balboa anyway, because I was hitting the canvas and just getting back up and throwing more punches,” he said.
“I thought, we’ll deal with this one, and we’ll get through it.
“We did. I got some casual guys in and ladies to organise the food, which was great.
“I’ve now secured a very well-known chef in the area.”
Stephen said that chef was Sam Prescott-Smith, who previously worked at the site when it was known as The Swallowed Anchor.
“The chef I’ve just secured, Sam, was the original chef when it first started as The Swallowed Anchor and was here for about four or five years, and basically built the kitchen,” he said.
“He said, ‘Mate, this place has a good piece of my heart, and I want to come and help you make it work’.”
While the food side of the business is new to Stephen, he’s familiar with entertainment, having been in the industry for 34 years.
“Back in 1991, I wanted to be a DJ, so I got my start in my first nightclub and then got professionally trained in voice work and things like that,” he said.
“I’ve got my own company supplying DJs and MCs and doing it myself for weddings, but being on the microphone is what I love.”
He said that company now did DJing, MCing and event coordination for anything from corporate events to celebrations, and would be one element he would incorporate into Dreams on Crown to help attract functions.
“As far as the restaurant and bar, I’m very raw, but you’ve got to start somewhere,” he said.
“I’ve had this dream for probably eight years of doing what I’m doing right now, and found every reason and excuse why I shouldn’t do it for eight years.”
With a marriage break-up last year, he decided now was the time to give it a go.
“I can’t go to the grave thinking what would have been or what could have been, win or lose, I’ve got to give this a go and put my heart and soul into it and see where we end up,” he said.
“I can then say, ‘Well, I’ve at least achieved my dream’.”
Stephen Umbleby inside his dream venue, which is the realisation of an eight-year vision.
It’s this outlook that ties into the venue name – Dreams on Crown.
“It’s obviously on Crown Street, but it’s all about a person’s dream for six to eight years, which has come to fruition,” he said.
While Stephen still lives at the southern end of Sydney, he said Wollongong was an attractive location because it was only 50 minutes away and the venue itself fitted his vision.
“I went down, had a look and I just fell in love with it,” he said of the venue, which was most recently Zzoo Restaurant and Bar.
“The fact it’s got the outdoor balcony looking over the mall in summer, that’ll just be a fantastic little space there.
“I thought, ‘This is it. This is the one. This is the dream’.”
Stephen said his vision was for lunch and dinner from Thursdays to Saturdays, with live entertainment or a DJ Friday and Saturday nights, and a family-friendly environment with bottomless brunches and live music sessions on Sundays.
“My licence is a bar licence, which means people can just come in and drink, they don’t have to eat,” he said.
“You can also get on the dance floor and dance away to retro-style music.”
Stephen said feedback had revealed a lot of “doof-doof music” was happening in the area but little they could sing along to, hence his focus on retro tunes.
He said the nightclub scene had changed a great deal since he started in the industry in the ’90s.
“Back in the early days, when I first started DJing, we’d get 1000 people Friday night in the nightclub,” he said.
“It was different then.”
He said his goal was to bring back the fun element from those times, encouraging staff to have as much of a good time as customers.
“Last Saturday night, one of the girls knew someone on the dance floor and they went up and danced with them,” he said.
“I want everyone who walks in to walk out saying how good was that and that the staff were having fun, laughing, joking and dancing.”
Dreams on Crown is at 156/160 Crown St, Wollongong.
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