Li’ly Resto Lounge

It’s not great, but there are worse venues in Toronto.
I’ll give it the 3 star review simply because you can catch some decent dj’s playing here from time to time, and has 2 rooms which for small to medium sized venues in Toronto is pretty rare nowadays.

This place is pretty awesome! There are different events on different nights and there is an upstairs (usually more chill) and a downstairs (usually for more dancing). Personally I enjoy the downstairs better.
Security, bartenders, etc. are all AMAZING and super nice.
There are a lot of techno /​tech house /​house events at Li’ly. We put on events there (Point Entertainment Toronto) and there are tons of other events like Jungle Funk parties and whatnot. Some of the best local DJs play there :)
Washrooms are OK as long as it’s not too busy lol otherwise there is a lineup. It’s also a bit inconvenient as the washrooms are only downstairs so you have to go downstairs (if the event you’re attending is upstairs) to use the washroom. Then if you’re downstairs and want to smoke, you have to go upstairs. Hahah.

Ended up here by the way of an invite to a party. The music was great. Basement seems a little dingy. The drinks were ok.

went here for some dancing on friday night…
we came early (10pm) and as expected the place was empty… but up until midnight main floor was still empty. noone danced…
we went downstairs and there were a few more people more or less pretending to dance.
music wasn’t any exciting too. drinks are on an expensive end.
basically for the $ 10 cover I would expect more.
don’t think I’ll be coming back.

The music was blasting way too loud. In the upstairs lounge-​ish area, the music was loud to the point of being extremely uncomfortable. How does one lounge in this place? The downstairs dance area was even worse. It looked like a concrete hideout/​cave with outdated and wimpy laser-​type rays of light pulsating to illuminate a small gathering of dancers who seemed like they were on something. May I have my hearing back?

Place is nice and has a great ambiance. I love the Thursday night band, Jumple and went to see them play one of their regular sets. Crowd was great and the music rocked.
Why the 1 star review? $ 2 for a highball glass of water with more ice than water. They charged this despite the fact that I had paid for other things at the bar and my friends had spent a fair bit on drinks as well.
As much as I love the band and as much as I would love to make this a regular spot to hang out, I can’t go back to Lily lounge for this reason alone.

Ughhhh… so… Li’ly…
This place is bad. I held a group event at Li’ly, party of 20. Called in 2 weeks in advance and asked about the menu, space, and pricing. Everything sounded good and they claimed to have served larger groups before, so this was a good sign.
Ohhh boy, it was much below anyone’s expectation.
To start, we were the only ones at the restaurant. The space was fine, big enough to accommodate larger groups and some dancing after wards. The bar was long and the bartender/​wait staff were friendly.
Drinks were expensive, 7 for domestic beers and more for import. The menu looked fine in print, but extremely disappointing when presented before our eyes. Although we made this reservation weeks ahead, they didn’t seem capable of handling our orders. The appetizers arrived 45 minutes after ordering. I remember this because I had time to walk over to The Spotted Pig (a restaurant a block east on college) for a few drinks before returning, just to wait an additional 7 minutes for the food to appear.
I ordered the Antipesto platter which was literally a mash of store bought olives recognizable from a grocery store (Metro across the street), deli sliced ham, a few grilled zucchini and toasted bread on the side. I mean… how can you serve this and get away with it? This was a crime against fresh and simple food. For $ 15, I expected much much more than store bought ham and olives… the wait time for this app wasn’t justified. Little did I know, they would eventually get away with a lot more…
The group ordered other appetizers as well, calamari, salads, etc. They were decent but not great by any stretch.
Another 30 minutes pass and our entrees come out. The servers didn’t remember who ordered what and in two cases, dishes that were not ordered by anyone were placed in front of us. The waiters began to accuse us of ordering the misfit dishes that no one considered ordering. One was a chicken dish served to a vegetarian. This was unacceptable.
When we asked for the manager, he came out with his guards up and without surprise, defended his restaurant and wanted us to pay for the unordered entrees. What kind of horse shizzy did we fall into?
After more debate, he stormed out of the restaurant without offering any solution to the matter. It was like dealing with a 5 year old, just a bit more hairy, and a bit more immature actually.
At that point, I wanted to leave. The food and experience was horrible. The waiters commented on their manager as well. He was unprepared and forgot about the reservation. The staff said that they never had to serve a group of 20 before.
In the end, the manager stormed back in passing our table without mentioning a word. We then begin to hear him yelling to or at the cook.
Whatever happened back there, I have no clue. But the last time we spoke to the manager was when we left the restaurant leaving a terrible tip and a few words of advice.
Oh, what about the food?
The Steak was cooked from frozen for…$ 28 bucks with a side of salad and no fries…
Noticeably from frozen because it was grainy. It was also cooked well-​done and not medium rare like I asked. My second steak came out when everyone else was finishing up their dinner. Such an epic fail.
Li’ly, NEVER AGAIN! Such a terrible experience. Although I don’t truly believe that Li’ly is garbage as a stand alone lounge, I think it’s absolute toxic waste as a restaurant. Ownership should change, people should’t have to deal with 5 year olds. Whatever happened to servicing the customer. They seem to be only concentrated on getting a quick buck.

I don’t know why there are two postings for the same place but I’m assuming «Li’ly» denotes the downstairs portion of this place.
Now I’ve passed by this place before and have actually kind of loved the music (electronic, house) that blasts from this place. But the clientele is just so… Woodbridge… And so I’ve always continued to mosey on down the road to meet at my intended spot.
But last night this WAS my intended spot and didn’t even realize it til I was at the doors saying to myself, «really?»
A few moments and 10 $ cover later (for the downstairs party– they were hosting an EDM party) I’m dancing to possibly some of the best electro house I’ve heard in Toronto. This is likely because of the party and not because of the venue– but it seems like this venue generally has some great potential and I’m looking forward to checking out subsequent electro-​house to make this 3 star place a 4.
really, the only weakness is the crowd– but when they host parties you get the regulars of the party and not the regulars of the venue, if you know what I mean.
Generally a great space. The upstairs has a nice long bar with some space up front to dance (although I’ve never seen it busy and I’ve never seen people dance even though the sound system is capable of a good dance party). Downstairs is a small square space– great intimate dance space and just enough room for how popular this place is as of now.
Come here, but bring your own crowd.
ps: I don’t know what’s with this place but it always seems a bit man heavy for gender breakdown– I never had to wait to use the washroom and the washrooms were really really clean at the end of the night still.

A bunch of my friends and I stopped by for my birthday this past weekend for the Lily lounge experience. The music was great, I am house/​trance fan. Upstairs had limited seating with folks smoking sheesha. The patio was packed but the upstairs dance floor was bare. It might have been the fact that we got there early, around 12:30am. I have been told that this place gets busy after 2am.
We ended up downstairs for about an hour and were dancing the night away.
Definitely recommend it for those into House/​Trance music.

I was extremely disappointed here, they had booked other djs at a private party, on top of the dj that was scheduled to be there months ahead of time. The managers made no apology and often dissapeared instead of dealing with the problem. If there is one place I would never step foot in again its Lily Lounge.

This is mostly a review for the nightclub (electronic/​trance/​house music).
Back in ’07, Lily was the place to be. The music was bumping, the bartenders were fast and the doormen were personable. So you’d expect that I’m about to say all of that changed somewhere in late ’08/’09. Well, it didn’t; but then «what happened!» you say. Well, it’s hard to explain, but Lily pretty much died of exhaustion, at one point the place tried to have R&B nights, which brought in crowds at first, but they were love ‘em and leave ‘em types. Then no one showed, since they thought Lily was now an R&B place. For a while they just didn’t open the club anymore.
So now we’re back to late ’09, start of ’10; and Lily is back for a last go at things. Music is good, Bartenders are good (not as experienced as they could be), small crowds are coming back on most weekends; but the real kicker is that they are open very late (5am which may not last).
So try Lily out for a relaxed after hours sometime, hey at least parking will be easy and free. Come before 2 though, since I think they hide the fact they are open after about 2:30 or so (it’s not a redbull and waters affair folks ;p).