My name is David,

an entrepreneur at heart,

an artist in practice,

and a creative in everything I do.

I create unique spaces

where Vancouver’s weird and wonderful

can work, play, and socialize.

My name is David,

an entrepreneur at heart,

an artist in practice,

and a creative in everything I do.

I create unique spaces where Vancouver’s weird and wonderful can work, play, and socialize.

In 2006, I started The Narrow Group. What began as one small bar has grown into six bars and restaurants and twelve creative artist studio buildings across Vancouver. Along the way, I also founded The Emerald, The Rickshaw Theatre, and The Fox Cabaret.

I bring life to empty spaces. When I travel, I notice what Vancouver is missing—a feeling, a vibe—and I come home to build it.

I design and lead every project myself. I figure it out as I go, put in the work, overcome the obstacles, and make it thrive.

Arts and culture are a force. We are an essential economic and cultural driver—and I believe Vancouver needs fun, unconventional ideas to shape its future.

We’ve spent years fighting the idea of “No Fun City.” Now we’re building a city full of life, creativity, and soul.

Because this is who I am.
It’s who we are.
And I love this city.

In 2006, I started The Narrow Group. What began as one small bar has grown into six bars and restaurants and twelve creative artist studio buildings across Vancouver. Along the way, I also founded The Emerald, The Rickshaw Theatre, and The Fox Cabaret.

I bring life to empty spaces. When I travel, I notice what Vancouver is missing—a feeling, a vibe—and I come home to build it.

I design and lead every project myself. I figure it out as I go, put in the work, overcome the obstacles, and make it thrive.

Arts and culture are a force. We are an essential economic and cultural driver—and I believe Vancouver needs fun, unconventional ideas to shape its future.

We’ve spent years fighting the idea of “No Fun City.” Now we’re building a city full of life, creativity, and soul.

Because this is who I am.
It’s who we are.
And I love this city.

How I got myself into this mess…

When I moved back to Vancouver from California in 2006, the city felt… quiet. Too quiet. The Vancouver I’d grown up in — the gritty, freewheeling port town of the seventies and eighties — was gone. The punk scene was just an echo. The strip clubs, the loggers, the longshoremen, the chaos — all of it replaced by a kind of polite sameness. No Fun City was real, and I couldn’t stand it.

So I started building the kinds of places I wanted to exist. The kinds of places I’d seen in San Francisco and L.A. — underground bars, weird art spaces, punk shows, witchy markets — the kind of creative chaos that makes a city feel alive. When I opened The Narrow, there wasn’t a single bar like it. So I put 30K on my credit cards and built it. Same with the Rickshaw — there wasn’t a rock-and-roll venue left in town. I never did a business plan or a model. I just saw what was missing and thought, fuck it, let’s do this.

For me, it’s always been about finding a way. I see a space and immediately imagine what it could be — the smell, the sound, the texture of it. I swing the hammer myself, thrift the art, design the feel. Every project is a piece of me. The Emerald was my Mad Men fever dream; Key Party my love letter to 1970s red velvet sleaze; Uncle Abe’s my wink to the weird and wonderful. I’m a photographer by training, so I think visually — spaces are like portraits you can walk inside.

At my core, I’m an entrepreneur — the kind who can’t not do it. If I see a better way, I have to make it real. I believe in bending the rules, not breaking them. I believe work is play. I believe integrity and nonconformity belong in the same sentence. And I believe fun is sacred.

Over the past twenty years, I’ve watched Vancouver’s alternative culture come back to life — dance clubs, bars, art spaces sprouting up where there used to be none. We have started to come out of the shadows to take our place in the establishment. I don’t claim that’s my legacy, but it’s the movement I wanted to see. The city’s got weirdness again. It’s got life again. And if I’ve played a part in that, then I’m good.