Sláinte and farewell. Toast de Vere’s Irish Pub, part of Sacramento’s ‘heart and soul’

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Every city has an Irish pub. Most don’t have a de Vere’s.

Both de Vere’s Irish Pubs will close for good on Sunday, marking the end of a decade and change for one of downtown Sacramento and Davis’ most influential modern bars. Sacramento natives Henry and Simon de Vere White, the family-owned restaurant and bar’s main proprietors, built two community staples that catalyzed the surrounding entertainment districts.

Sacramento’s grid was depressed when de Vere’s first opened at 1521 L St. in 2009. The recession had hit, there was little worth gathering for nearby and all indications pointed toward the Kings leaving.

But almost instantaneously, de Vere’s was a hit. The pub got city permission to close down the entire block of 15th and L streets in 2009 and 2010 for St. Patrick’s Day parties, then drew so many people it had to move the event to César Chávez Plaza in 2011. It was the spot for nearby state employees on business lunches, for young professionals grabbing a drink at night and without a doubt for World Cup watch parties that occasionally spilled into street revelry.

“They brought a real sense of energy and I think validity to the downtown core,” Downtown Sacramento President Michael Ault told me. “To say we will miss them is an understatement. They’re part of the energy and entrepreneurial spirit we wanted to come down here ... it’s a loss. They were part of the heart and soul of this district.”

“It has been just two years since this pub opened in the heart of midtown and already I cannot imagine the Sacramento dining and night life scene without it,” then-Bee dining critic Blair Anthony Robertson wrote in a 2011 review that awarded de Vere’s three-and-a-half stars out of four.

I’d quibble with Robertson about the dividing line between midtown and downtown, but can’t argue about de Vere’s presence, which also played out in my hometown of Davis. When de Vere’s moved into 217 E St. in 2011, that building had housed four restaurants in three years and neighbored a slice of downtown we called “the corner of death” for the endless string of short-lived businesses that briefly called it home.

De Vere’s brought stability. It was an unfussy adult bar in a college town, the de facto spot for grown-up couples or Davis natives home for the holidays. I vaguely remember stumbling out of there once after bottomless mimosas, but most visits were just a pint with long-lost friends, corned beef hash brunch with my parents or trivia nights hosted by UC Davis lecturer and poet Andy Jones.

The de Vere White brothers, not big on kitsch, took pains to make their pub as Irish as possible. De Vere’s employees butchered meat, brined rashers (Irish bacon), stuffed sausages and baked Irish brown bread in-house daily. It had a 100-year-old cast iron mantle from the motherland, family heirlooms in the alcoves and dozens of Irish books. When I returned from studying abroad in Cork, Ireland, I searched high and low for the craic I’d come to know; de Vere’s was the only place remotely like the real thing.

It will be missed. For now, the de Vere White brothers insist people remember the good times rather than focus on the end. Raise a glass in person or in spirit until closing time on Sunday, Oct. 3.