QUIVR to turn up the volume with new music-first extension, the Sound Room

When Dara and Hollee Sol founded QUIVR in 2020, they set out to create a home for a corner of Brisbane’s music community that was struggling to find one.

Since then, the Winn Lane-based, queer-owned enterprise has grown into a thriving ecosystem spanning an online radio station, livestream booth, DJ school, agency and bar. Along the way, QUIVR has become both a breeding ground for emerging talent and a beloved place to party, with its tight-knit community growing alongside it.

But as its following has expanded, so too has demand. Over the past 12 months, booking requests have increased in both frequency and scale, with Dara and Hollee forced to turn down events simply because the venue couldn’t accommodate them.

“We came in and created a different type of setting where people could really explore their musical tastes in the live-stream booth,” says Hollee of QUIVR’s original mandate. “They started to make connections and we really encouraged them – the young promoters – to put on their own parties.”

“Our bookings inbox was overflowing to the point where we hired a bookings manager just to handle the inquiries,” adds Dara.

“We’d help them and work with them, but we could only ever fit 100 people through the door. Any more and we were just like, ‘I’m sorry, this is breaking point,’ and then they’d leave and go to another venue purely because of capacity or weather. All these inquiries are coming, but we needed more space – we were capped here.”

The solution, fortunately, arrived in two parts. First, QUIVR received funding through the Revive Live grant, an Australian Government program supporting live-music venues and the long-term sustainability of the music industry. Then, around the same time, an adjacent space on Winn Street became available.

“Arthur [Apostolos, owner of Winn Lane] had this site, which was the old Tym Guitar’s space, so it’s always been a part of the heart and soul of the valley, as was The Zoo, and now Crowbar,” says Hollee.

You might like

Best Of

Save room – these are Brisbane’s biggest openings still to come in 2026

Food & Drink

The recap: Brisbane’s best new food and drink openings of July

“We asked him, ‘Can we knock down a wall?’” adds Dara, with a chuckle.

The pair are now preparing to unveil the QUIVR Sound Room, a 170-capacity addition that will significantly expand the venue’s footprint while remaining firmly rooted in its original home.

You might like

Best Of

Save room – these are Brisbane’s biggest openings still to come in 2026

Food & Drink

The recap: Brisbane’s best new food and drink openings of July

Slated to open in early September, the concept is part hi-fi listening lounge, part live-performance space and part wine bar, deliberately positioned somewhere between Brisbane’s club and culinary scenes. For Hollee and Dara, it’s also an opportunity to create the kind of venue they themselves are looking for now.

“We first did a really deep dive into who we are,” says Hollee. “We’re now in our 40s, so it’s like, what’s the 40-year-old version of a venue that I want to be in now? What we have observed is that there’s a whole lot of people that are outgrowing The Valley and its high volume and high chaos. Where is their home?”

“We’ve also got the beautiful foodies from James Street who know their food and wine, who are Valley curious. Where do they go after they’ve had dinner? QUIVR lies in the middle of that.”

A new street-facing entrance on Winn Street will lead into a dedicated dining space, where a compact kitchen will serve a tight menu of snack-style fare designed to be enjoyed alongside the music. A considered wine program and cocktail list will further distinguish the QUIVR Sound Room from the existing laneway bar.

“The whole concept is around side plates,” says Hollee of the QUIVR Sound Room menu. “It’s not knife and fork stuff – it’s about what is going to sustain you if you’re here for a few bottles of wine, if you’re here with mates, or if you’re going off to dinner and then coming back.”

“We’re also leaning a lot more into the wine in this zone. The laneway bar is more cocktail and beer focused, whereas here is definitely more loungey with a bit more of a sophisticated palette without being too bougie – there’s this lovely balance.”

While the QUIVR Sound Room will see the crew exploring food and drink more deeply, music remains the thing around which everything is built.

At the venue’s heart will sit a custom, hand-built speaker system (designed from scratch by sound architect Ethan Greaves) and tailored to suit the room’s acoustics. A custom-built DJ booth equipped with bespoke equipment will sit on the floor among the crowd in front of a stage boasting a professional backline. When not in use, the stage will hold modular bleacher-style seating, enveloping the booth from behind.

“The cool thing about it is, with this grant, it has given us the breathing room to say, ‘Okay, if we were going to do this really, really right, how would we do it and what does that look like?’” says Dara.

“We can purely design the sound first – and rather than going external from our community, we’ve got a friend on board to build it with us to design it with the room in focus,” adds Hollee.

Visually, the team is steering clear of the dark, vintage aesthetic typically associated with listening bars, instead opting for something colourful, contemporary and a little more left-field.

“We wanted to lean not on your typical vintage listening bar look – we want it to feel like a flagship store,” says Hollee. “A bit more arty, a bit more edgy.”

With more room and greater optionality to work with, Dara and Hollee are relishing the chance to expand QUIVR’s programming (including QUIVR Radio, which will relaunch to coincide with the Sound Room’s opening).

Once up and running, the addition will host local selectors and emerging artists, while the boost in capacity and high-end equipment will enable the team to bring in interstate and international acts that weren’t previously viable.

“Inside will definitely lean on all of Brisbane’s amazing sound, getting them in and playing on an amazing sound system,” says Hollee.

“The live-music element will be an important part. It’s going to have a certain tone – world music and jazz, plus obviously queer stuff is always true to our hearts.”

All told, the QUIVR Sound Room is shaping up to be a new kind of oasis for Brisbane music fans – a sound-first listening lounge where electronic music, live performance, wine and small plates converge, bridging the gap between scenes and demographics.

Most importantly, though, it will further empower and cater to the community that has been with QUIVR since day one – the humans that have grooved, swayed, boogied and danced.

“We’ve always evolved at the rate that the community wanted us to,” says Dara. “People love the space – they love it as their own, they love how unique it is, they love that they can do their own thing here.”

The QUIVR Sound Room is expected to open in time for BIGSOUND in September. Stay tuned for more.