PEORIA MAGAZINE July 2022

D I S H A N D D R I N K

BEER, WHISKEY, COMMUNITY Princeton’s Barrel Society has it all, plus vintage music, movies and a colorful character behind the bar

BY PHIL LUCI ANO PHOTOS BY RON JOHNSON

P rinceton’s Barrel Society is more fun than a barrel of monkeys, and then some. Any day at the saloon, visitors can watch classic comedy or horror films (sound off) on the widescreen TV as vinyl (mostly metal and punk) blares from the turntable. Meantime, the walls rivet your attention via a visual whirl of paintings and screen-prints (floating kegs, meandering skulls and other colorful psychedelia), suggesting an otherworldly feel. And if you’re hungry, there’s a good chance a catered food event or Chicago food truck might be serving up delicacies that day. Oh yeah – you can also get something to drink. The beverage offerings include 350 whiskies, 110 craft beers and about 20 specialty cocktails. If that’s not enough, the staff is whipping up new cocktail recipes all the time. “What we do is different than 99.9 percent of businesses within a 50-mile radius,” said owner Nick Gorogianis, 37. “It’s just fun. I don’t want people to sit here and be on their phones. It’s about music and movies and atmosphere as much as the booze.” The sensorial swirl percolates amid the generations-old but oft lively storefronts of Princeton, the

Like many of his customers, Gorogianis comes fromout of town. He grewup in the DuPage County village of Bloomingdalebeforeheadingdownstate to attend Monmouth College. Friends there took him to their hometown of Princeton, and he fell in love. “It has genuine people,” he said. “And the town is beautiful.” After graduating college in 2007, Gorogianis worked in public relations and construction. But he kept finding himself thinking of Princeton. In 2018, he made his move. On Main Street, he bought a brick building – ruggedly weathered, with plenty of height and space – constructed in 1896 as a pencil factory. It later spent seven decades as a men’s clothing store before becoming a woman’s boutique. Gorogianis had another vision. “I had to do a ton of remodeling and renovation,” he said. The intense labor included adding an entire bar and back bar, plus redoing the ductwork and plumbing. Later, he added the high-end Bottle Shop liquor store in a rear room, along with a patio out back. As he stocked the joint with hard-to find beers and top-notch whiskeys, he came up with the name Barrel Society, which carries a distinct meaning.

Barrel Society is located at 930 N Main Street

7,800-resident seat of ag-centric Bureau County. Amid a commercial district popping with boutiques and shops, Barrel Society flashes an inviting smile that carries both small-town friendliness and big-city polish. “We get people from Chicago. We get people from all over,” Gorogianis said. “We hear from people that there’s nothing elsewhere like this atmosphere.”

18 JULY 2022 PEORIA MAGAZINE