North America’s top women bartenders collaborating in Toronto

Some of the top women bartenders in all of North America will be coming together for one night only in Toronto to celebrate female talent.

No Vacancy and Cry Baby Gallery have been crowned some of the very best bars in North America, and both of them can be found not far away from each other in Toronto. The two bars have both placed on the most recent edition of the list of North America’s 50 Best Bars.

No Vacancy has been ranked at number 82 on the prestigious list and Cry Baby Gallery comes in at number 69. Cry Baby Gallery was also ranked all the way up at number 11 on the list of Canada’s 100 Best Bars in 2025.

Now, the two bars are coming together and some of their best bartenders who just so happen to be women are teaming up to bring the best of the best to cocktail lovers in Toronto for a collaborate night that won’t be easily forgotten.

Both bars have moody, dimly lit, intimate spaces in Toronto. Cry Baby Gallery is so named because it’s actually hidden behind an a real art gallery in Toronto, which you have to walk through in order to gain access to the dark, secretive space at the back. There, they serve original cocktails made with refined techniques, which often draw inspiration from classic old school retro cocktail culture.

That means the bartenders from Cry Baby Gallery should be right at home in the cozy and dim space where the collaboration event will be happening, at No Vacancy. With soft lighting, sophisticated textures and a calming colour palette, the design of No Vacancy matches their elegant and subtle yet cheeky approach to cocktails made with Asian-leaning ingredients like yuzu, pandan, shiso, and ume.

The collaborative evening will spotlight Yuki Kuroiwa from Cry Baby Gallery, who will be working alongside No Vacancy’s Kat Yu. Kuroiwa has been working at Cry Baby Gallery since the year 2021, and will be creating her own specialty cocktails for the special night at No Vacancy and also creating cocktails in collaboration with Yu.

The menu of cocktails should be reflective of the personalities and styles of both bars, and will serve to celebrate the achievements of both bars and their star women bartenders.

The event will take place at No Vacancy on Ossington Avenue in Toronto on April 14 from 6 p.m. until late. Reservations are available on Open Table.