Grad Center Bar

The best. Hard to find, but that’s part of the adventure!

The drinks are cheap, the company is great and sometimes they have fun theme nights that they post about on the Facebook page! It’s really geared towards brown grad/​Med/​senior students so don’t expect to find too many locals hanging out here, though all are certainly welcome (for a small cover fee)

Open to everyone.
Location– can be tough to find. From Thayer and Charlesfield, walk west up Charlesfield (toward Brown Street) until you reach a ramp. Go up the ramp and you’ll see several buildings. The first building to the right will have a door on the level of the ramp– this is the entry point. Go down the stairs and you’ll find the mystical, magical GCB. Annual membership is fairly priced (30 – 40 dollars?), otherwise a $ 5 cover that’s well worth it.
Chill vibes– several rooms to hang out and has everything you’d want. Pool tables, pinball machines, cheese boards, board games, cheap high quality (and generously poured) drinks. There’s a main room that upon entering and three others that come off of it with different kinds of seating/​ambiance to suit your mood. Whether you come with one other person or your entire friend group, it’ll be a good time. Can get a bit packed on the weekends with somewhat longer waits, but still one of the best bars around.

Heh I love the GCB. Cheap drinks, fun and quirky ambience, and cool bartenders — what more could you want? Honestly, this bar is where I ordered my first drink, and it will always have a special place in my heart.
The bar has a front seating area, a pool room, a loungier room with couches, and a game room with darts and a South Park pinball machine. The drinks variety is wide, with all your usual cocktails, a good selection of craft brews, and even champagne. The Moscow mule is particularly tasty, and if you like sweet drinks, try the framboise lambic — it’s basically raspberry soda. The bartenders are awesome people and handle the rush hours admirably. One of them is a Brown professor!
The customers are mostly undergrad and grad students, and lines start to form around 11pm, so if you want good seats, it is ideal to come a bit earlier. Overall, this is a really chill place with cheap, yummy drinks!

Amazing underground space. the best vibe. LOVE IT

I really enjoyed this little spot, especially as a Brown affiliate. If you’re a Brown Grad, you can get a fairly cheap annual pass and bring as many as ?3 guests for free everytime you visit. As far as I know, this is a non-​profit establishment, and the beer selection is quite impressive for a clean dive bar and very cheap. The mixed drinks are not the highest qualities in the world, but they definitely make up for it with the impressive amount of liquor to mixer ratio. There’s a pool table and some board games and plenty of chairs. Depending on the season, it’ll either be relatively quiet, and full to the brim with recent age-​appropriate college seniors, grad students or med students after an exam.
I do like this place, and I’d say it’s probably the best place to meet young, intelligent people for the first time in the bar-​scene.

The prices alone earn these 5 stars. Cheap beers for $ 2 and a wide variety of craft beers for $ 4 – 5. Food is limited to a cheese plate and bar snacks, but food isn’t the point of a basement college bar… Service is excellent, but if you go during peak hours on a Friday/​Saturday night, expect a crowd at the bar.
Basically, go early, bring a couple friends, enjoy some good beer (or other drinks if you’re feeling crazy), and relax!

Your typical college bar, like my friend said it feels like I’m in a dining hall but they’re giving me alcohol instead of food.
I had the amber cider which was pretty good, it was pretty strong for cider. We also ordered jerky, pistachios, hummus and chips. It was disappointing that they didn’t serve the jerky or pistachios on plates but just in their packages. Snacks a little overprice for the quantity and quality.

The GCB, lovingly called amongst my friends as «The Secret Bar,» because it is so tucked away.
You head down the stairs, round a bend, and you’re there. $ 5 cover to get in, but worry-​not, imbibers! This is some top-​notch subsidized alcohol. That’s right. Subsidized, meaning drinks are less expensive. Glory be!
It can get a little obnoxious in here, but the cool-​as-​you-​will bartender, Pat, makes up for it. He’s a champ and unfailingly polite. If you don’t know what to drink, he’ll make a great recommendation.
So, take a chance on something new, it won’t cost you that much, maybe just a hangover.

Available only to Brown students or guests of Brown students, the GCB is a perfect dive bar. The drinks are cheap, and the rooms are dark. For $ 4 you can get a super strong dark & stormy, and for reasonable prices you can get whole pitchers of some pretty decent beers.

I’ve been a member of this place for about two years now, and it’s been completely worth it. The membership is $ 30 a year, but drinks are consistently $ 1 – 2 cheaper than at other beer bars, and the selection is consistently the best in town. If you are into beer, it’s a no-​brainer. They also let you bring in your own food if you want to, which is tempting is you happen to be walking past East Side Pockets on your way there.

I love. this. place. If you go before 11, its pretty chill and not full of students yet. It’s quiet enough for a meeting or catching up with friends and the drinks are sooooo cheap. It is member only, so you either need to pay 35 dollars for a year long membership or you can pay 5 dollars each visit. Either way, the drink prices make it worth it. It can be a little tricky to find, but once you do, it’s pretty great. They have pool too!

The best of Providence, urban exploring, and top notch beer on the cheap. A super chill bar nestled in the concrete jungle that is Brown’s ugliest (and only riot proof) dorm.
Nothing to say that hasn’t already been said, so I’ll preach to the choir: the GCB is the greatest! Cheap beer, great bartenders, lots of variety (rooms with tables, room with couches and TV, room with pool), super weird experience finding it in the first place, and a good mix of community members, Brown grad students, and Brown undergrads.
Quirks — it’s member only, but if you just want to check it out before committing you can pay $ 5 (think of it as a cover to get a $ 2.50 Newcastle — still a total deal).
I recommend going on the earlier side, happy-​hour ish, to avoid the undergrad rush.

As a Brown Undergrad, after hearing hype about the GCB for years, this was one of the first bars I hit up once I turned 21. I totally get its appeal — really cheap beer, laid-​back and fun atmosphere, and you’re bound to run into familiar faces.
It felt like this was a lot of people’s «go-​to» bar, and I can see why. It’s not-​for-​profit, so the drinks are actualllyyy cheap, they have a great beer selection, and I think I even saw someone order a cheese plate! I love cheese!

The atmosphere: dark, divey, hipster: where, after a long day of research; experiments; poring over literature; or whatever it is that grad students do in their never-​ending quest to gain eternal knowledge; one can relax, calmed by the hazy twinkle of Christmas lights, or the blacklit chalkboard of beers galore. Comfy seats are accompanied by bar stools, and on a busy night are hard to come by. The bathrooms are lined with comics (a great way to pass time in the john).
The aforementioned beer selection is one of the best I have seen in any bar, let alone in Providence. Perhaps it’s due to the membership fee, but prices are considerably lower here than most places I’ve been to. Feeling overwhelmed? The bartenders are usually willing to give some pointers.
I am oh so fortune to be dating a Brown grad student! That way, I can be granted guest access to the exclusive GCB. (And not exclusive, as in, «we’re too good for the rest of the world,» «what label are you wearing,» etc.) It has recently come to my attention that a membership can be purchased for the average joe; I may need to take advantage of this.

The smell walking down into the GCB always makes me think that I am headed towards a musky underground pool and damn do I love it.
Brown graduate students have a membership by default at this bar, anyone else can pay a modest fee to join. The atmosphere is great and the drinks are kept really cheap. Great rotation on the beer and a great whiskey selection. The bartender Bill is awesome, probably one of my favorite bartenders in the world

Cool concept, but don’t bother if you’re a visiting tourist (aka me). This bar is aimed towards the Brown community. Nothing wrong with that, but it makes it that much harder to meet new people.

Great selection of beers and it’s partially subsidized so the prices are great. But if your not a Brown student or married to one (it has it’s perks!), you have to pay a cover or for a membership so keep that in mind if you’re planning to just waltz in there.
Lots of tables and seating as well as pool tables and darts. Fun yet (mostly)educated crowd and there’s always some high level mathematics conversation to listen in on.
No food, save for popcorn, but it’s totally chill to bring takeout or even have a pizza delivered there.

Such a fan!
Okay, here’s why (yes, yet another ‘numbered’ list):
ONE: Totally Chill. Capital ‘C’ very intentional.
TWO: Cheap. Great beer. Fantastic cocktails. And vino. At reasonable prices. Why? Because it is a private club. That’s why you pay a membership — to help keep the prices low!
THREE: No sign. If you’ve seen my list, you know. Any bar worth serving a decent pint does not NEED a sign. Boo-​yah. Head down the sketchy driveway two blocks from the substation on Power Street — head round the dumpster and into the unmarked door — just down that hall and passed the restrooms is the GCB.
FOUR: There is an iguana smoking a cigarette in the tank as you enter. Yeah, it’s fake. But the entire bar is like that — random and cool. The ORIGINAL art from the dry wall transformed into a poster series: «Providence RI, where it rains 2 days out of 3, except for the rainy season when it snows like a bi*&^, where Friendship is a one-​way street, the rich folks live on Power, but most of us live off Hope». My favorite PVD quote of ALL time! No idea who said it — but there it is, on the GCB wall. And then a bunch of low key room off that with a similar kitschy vibe. The cocktail napkin collage — the board games tables — the pool table — the dart boards. Yeah, pretty cool interior.
FIVE: Cool bartenders. They may actually check IDs, but think of it as a compliment to how young you look! Patrick. I heart you. Great conversation, great sense of humor, great beer recommendations — take their advice!
SIX (yes, I got all the way to 6): I just love it. I do. Not my scene Fri and Sat. But during the week, I proudly handed over the $ 30 for an academic year (not calendar year FYI) membership (Brown Grad Students have automatic membership and unlimited guests, the rest of us get 3 guests with a membership).
Good to know: ‘cover’ aka one-​day membership ($ 5) and academic-​year (including summer) membership ($ 30) are cash only.
For your bar tab, cards: $ 10 minimum.
Simple menu: cheese, pizza, meat, chips. Music — can be cool and is always bartender’s paylists. Expect the unexpected. Use the Shazam app on your smart phone if you want to know what you’re listening to. Choose to drink real beer if you come here, otherwise the bartenders have license to heckle you — as they (will and) should.
You’ll be fine, and you’ll love it — promise.

I went to Brown, and I practically lived in the GCB my senior year, so I’m totally biased.
The atmosphere is great for a university bar. A strict no 21-​year old policy and a cover/​membership fee keeps out the younglings and the riff-​raff. Décor and lighting does a good job of hiding that you’re in the heart of a 60s-​era riot-​proof dorm.
Drink prices are extremely reasonable — bottles are $ 3 and pints are $ 4 – 5. Bartenders are friendly, but are hard to access on crowded nights. On a related note, the space is small and capacity is very strictly enforced.
Highly recommend stopping by if you’re in the area. It’s a surprisingly enjoyable bar on the Brown campus.