Picture a store selling some of the most unique furnishings from India and Southeast Asia. Now picture a bar in the middle of the store and that pretty much describes the Imperial inside Sanford’s Washburn Imports. Sure the Imperials in Ivanhoe Village (the original) and the one that opened in Winter Park have similar aesthetics, but only the Sanford outpost serves liquor, and their cocktail program caters to connoisseurs. Besides, how many joints can sell you a quality Sazerac and the seat you’re sitting on?

It’s the spot for bullfighting vampires to get their drink on, though those with a penchant for enjoying spirited beverages in dimly lit parlors will find this Ivanhoe Village haunt just as appealing. The Matador is the quintessential neighborhood bar with its easygoing mien, but that’s not to say it doesn’t get a bit raucous come the stroke of midnight. Patrons often pour out onto the patio sipping their gin and tonics and Torontos for all of Virginia Drive to see.

Quality quaffs in pretense-free digs is lure enough for liquorists to the Guesthouse in Mills 50. By day, the large square bar at the space’s core is bathed in sunlight and potted plants happily photosynthesize around its perimeter. By night, the bar takes on an ethereal complexion as guests purposefully sip between two ferns (or more) and barkeeps swizzle and shake potent potables of the highest order. Out on the back parking lot, an Airstream trailer serving cocktails keeps the party going.

Joined at the hip to legendary live music venue Will’s Pub, Lil Indies is a gathering ground for hipsters, subversives and anti-corporate activists who fancy a properly crafted seasonal cocktail while discussing strategies on how to change the world, all while listening to the croonings of a local act. Dingy collides with French Provincial in the oddly shaped rooms, and a rotating cocktail menu with names like “John Waters Is Dead” (it’s got dill Aperol, gin, genepy, egg white, lime and local Smiling Goat shrubs) keeps things equally amusing.

Celebrating the magical pairing of gin and vermouth, this micro-bar in the North Quarter is small in space but big on style. Martinis are the draw, of course, and its espresso martini served with a house-made coffee lollipop warrants consideration. The “Monkeying Around” is a quintessential quaff for Orlando lovers with gin, citrus, honey and “Bees Knees” shrub fashioned from local purveyor Smiling Goat. The monkey wallpaper practically warrants an order. The bar is the brainchild of V Group Concepts, the team behind Hanson’s Shoe Repair and Bauhaus.

A fixture of downtown’s cocktail scene, the Woods is yet another bar housed inside a historic building, the 1924-constructed Rose Building on N. Orange Avenue to be exact. Just make sure to head up the stairs to the second-floor bar as the Lodge on the ground floor has a decidedly different (read drunken) vibe. The Woods is chill, in a Twin Peaks-y sort of way, and house cocktails can sometimes take on Lynchian kookiness (reposado tequila + Italicus + falernum + Domaine de Canton + green Chartreuse + mulled fig syrup + bitters + lemon = an Enamorada). That said, the vast selection of whiskeys and ryes keep hooch hounds content.

Even those with a love/hate relationship with tiki culture will find it hard to find fault with this nostalgia-filled bar – it’s got enough South Pacific kitsch and rum to keep Richard Rodgers and Captain Morgan amused. Rattan furniture, grass skirts and over-the-top cocktail vessels aside, there are some stiff drinks to be had, most notable of which is the signature, and rum-less, “Tiger Fucker” – a fuschia-hued drink of 44° North potato vodka, jalapeno-blackberry syrup, lemon juice and passion fruit juice in an ice-filled schooner glass. It’s then garnished with a flaming sugar cube sitting atop a lemon slice. Needless to say, it’s lit.

Boutique spirits, seasonal ingredients, cordials, bitters, and syrups are all necessary requirements in modern-day cocktail making, but what Mathers Social Gathering brings to Orlando (apart from another speakeasy) is a level of big city sophistication. It’s like the city’s very own Soho House, sans the high fees, but with all the style. The spacious bar is housed on the third floor of an 1884 building replete with vintage furnishings, antique accents, soaring bookshelves and cozy brick-lined nooks. While drinks have that old-timey flair, their pricing reflects a current age, that is, pricey. Dress dapper.

Equal parts Brooklyn loft and West Elm showroom, the second-floor bar in the historic Robinson Building is a paean to pomo art and poisons in every way. It’s from the same group who brought Mathers Social Gathering into our cocktail consciousness and who envision the Robinson Cocktail Room to be “a bastion for the avante-garde.” No doubt, that ethic is reflected in drinks incorporating a dose of the uncommon with a dash of molecular gastronomy. Think the boozy and bitter riff on a Martinez called “Death by Elocution” with Treaty Oak Old Youpon and Bristow barrel-aged gin, a vermouth blend and maraschino foam. It’s then dusted with the powdered skins of lacto-fermented kiwis. If that isn’t out there enough, take a swig and stare at the skeleton display of a sabre-toothed tiger encased in glass.

The speakeasy thing has become a somewhat tired novelty, so once entry to Hanson’s Shoe Repair has been secured by procuring the password from the Twitters (@HansonsShoeShop), head to the Hanson Building (generally considered to be the oldest building in Orlando) and give the person minding the door on the third-floor the “secret” code. Once seated inside the tight, dimly lit space, relax and savor the stiff potions designed by Rene Nguyen, one of Orlando’s finest cocktail creators. There’s even a small outdoor area for those feeling a bit claustrophobic. Oh, and don’t be overly nonplussed by couples making out — it’s a thing here.

The elevated 18th-floor setting of this downtown haunt generates plenty of buzz for its cocktails with a view splendor, but the bartenders aim high with classics juiced with some big-city swagger. There may be no better spot to enjoy a sunset margarita, though happy hour can get a bit dodgy with imbibers jockeying for seats.