Wedding DJ at Dram & Draught in Raleigh, NC

The Space

Kevin Barrett and Drew Schenck opened this bar in July 2016 after Barrett made Schenck a cocktail and the two decided to go into business together, setting out to build the best neighborhood bar they could rather than a formal event space. Their name plays on liquor measurements, a dram being a unit of liquid volume and a draught a pour of beer, and the whiskey collection they built around it now runs past 300 bottles from around the world.

The original location lived inside a renovated 1930s gas station and auto shop on Hillsborough Street, a building that had sat empty for eight years before Dram & Draught moved in, and the menu still nods to that past with a line called "Registered Lubrication," taken from the original garage’s signage. When that building was demolished for the One Glenwood development, the bar relocated to 1 Glenwood Ave in April 2019, where it operates now in the Glenwood South neighborhood of downtown Raleigh.

Capacity & Layout

When fully rented for a private event, the bar holds up to 100 people, a figure that applies to both a seated and a standing layout. That capacity puts this venue in reach for a rehearsal dinner, a welcome party, or a smaller wedding reception rather than a large guest list, and a couple planning around 100 or fewer guests gets the whole space, bar and patio included, without competing with regular customers.

The layout splits between an indoor bar with counter seating and a full bar setup, and a covered patio with downtown views plus an additional outdoor seating area. That gives a couple two distinct zones to work with inside one rental: the indoor bar for cocktail service and dancing, and the patio for guests who want fresh air or a quieter conversation without leaving the party.

Amenities

The bar itself is the headline amenity, stocked with more than 300 whiskeys alongside craft cocktails, draught beer, and wine, run by a staff built around cocktail service rather than a rented-in bar for the night. Outside catering is permitted for a private event, and the bar can recommend catering partners it has worked with successfully before, which saves a couple from vetting a caterer from scratch.

The covered patio gives guests a downtown view and a place to step outside during a reception, and the space is wheelchair accessible for guests who need it. Parking is not on site, with paid hourly parking available across Morgan Street in the Origin Hotel deck, worth mentioning to guests ahead of time since this is a downtown bar rather than a venue with its own lot.

Location & Getting There

The bar sits in Glenwood South, one of downtown Raleigh’s dense nightlife and dining blocks, which means guests arriving for a wedding reception here have restaurants, other bars, and hotels within walking distance for the rest of the weekend. Regular hours run Monday through Friday from 3pm to 2am and Saturday through Sunday from noon to 2am, though private event hours for a wedding would be arranged separately with the venue.

We have worked an event at this bar before, and the space favors a DJ setup built for a contained room rather than an open hall: the indoor bar is a smaller, hard-surfaced space where sound reflects and fills the room quickly, so volume can run lower than a ballroom setup, while the covered patio needs its own speaker placement to keep the outdoor crowd connected to the same music as the bar inside.