Delaware Cigar And Bourbon Room With Modern Vintage Appeal

[JohnS]

The following article is another personal mission to convert a spare room in one's house into a dedicated Cigar Den. I know we love reading these type of articles on our forum so please enjoy the following...

Delaware Cigar And Bourbon Room With Modern Vintage Appeal

Mar 28, 2024 By Garrett Rutledge

Adam Beaudry wasn't planning on creating a cigar room, but after being gifted a brand new humidor, one thing led to another and his cigar sanctuary was born.

he idea of creating your own cigar room can seem like a daunting task. Readers of this magazine have shown their willingness to go the extra mile, from fully renovated basements to standalone structures built strictly for cigar-smoking. While we certainly admire such grand creations, great cigar rooms come in many different sizes and make-ups. There is only one critical requirement: that the space serve as a place of refuge for the cigar smoker. For 40-year-old Adam Beaudry of Middletown, Delaware, all it took was a humidor gifted to him by his wife. Before he knew it, he had a remarkable cigar room on his hands.

For Christmas of 2021, Beaudry’s wife bought him a new, 200-capacity, climate-controlled humidor. While most people would consider it a welcomed gift, to Beaudry, it was a bit perplexing at first. “I was like ‘huh, well what do I need this many cigars for?’” Her answer was simple: “I thought you would want to make a lounge in the basement.” At the time, Beaudry considered himself more of a Bourbon drinker than a cigar smoker. He had only a small humidor, and only smoked cigars every now and then.

Beaudry's room offers a nice balance between modern and vintage, which comes as a result of utilizing unique methods to furnish his space.

But the gift and idea lit a spark in Beaudry, who was intrigued (if a bit skeptical) by the prospect of adding a cigar room to his house. He had a 10-by-15 carpeted room in his basement, which at the time was serving no purpose. Beaudry was initially concerned that smoke filtration would be an issue, but then he realized it might be ideal. “There was no HVAC in that room, there were no vents,” he says. “So I was like, alright we might be onto something here.”

He went out and bought a RabbitAir purifier and a Blue Ox 1100 Commercial Smoke Eater, the latter of which he mounted to the wall. “While those were on order, we ripped out the carpet and put in some wood-look, LVP flooring,” says Beaudry, who quickly committed to the idea. “It wasn’t a difficult project because of the smoke eater.” By February of 2022, the cigar room was fully up-and-running.

While Beaudry’s room is full of unique finds sure to grab your attention, as you enter, there’s an undeniable magnetism to the subdued, steel blue wall straight ahead. Eight rows of shelves lined with fine Bourbon and whisky hang on the wall, with virtually no room to spare. The shelves are split into two columns with four rows apiece on either side of a mounted Samsung frame television. Beaudry installed LED lights behind each shelf, which create a captivating aura around the bottles when they’re on and the main lights are off, a bit like what’s often seen at high-end bars. The feature is fitting for Beaudry’s collection, which includes many well-known brands such as Angel’s Envy, High West, Blackened, Booker’s, Macallan, Redbreast and Lagavulin, just to name a few.

The effect created by the LED lights Beaudry installed suits the impressive Bourbon and whisky collection on-hand in his cigar room.

Under the television, a large speaker is mounted to the wall with a sizable black leather chest, Beaudry’s smaller humidor and a pair of whisky decanters sitting beneath it. A pair of vintage ashtray holders flank either side of the chest. This array of items, from the modern technology to the vintage, antique pieces, are symbolic of the overall character Beaudry has developed with his room. The dichotomy between old and new is undoubtedly present yet harmoniously blended together. “I just slowly gather things here and there, and put it all together,” says Beaudry.

As you move back from the wall, in the center of the room, a gold chandelier with an Art Deco ambiance hangs above and is joined by a few pairs of built-in ceiling lights. A circular, two-level glass coffee table with gold trimmings is positioned directly below the chandelier, sitting on top of a square, tan and brown Turkish rug. The coffee table furnishings include an Arturo Fuente ashtray. 

Retreating further from the wall, you’ll find a pair of studded, rich brown leather chairs, each slightly angled towards an opposite end of the room. For additional seating, a barstool sits on the left-hand side of the room as you face towards the far wall with the shelves and the television. Just behind it, in the near, left corner of the room, is an antique slot machine that’s been passed down through Beaudry’s family. Its most recent owner, his Uncle Bill, who passed away in 2017, was what Beaudry calls his “best friend.” That beloved Uncle also left him his 2010 Jaguar XKR. “He wasn’t a rich guy by any means but he always loved Jags,” says Beaudry.

The Blue Ox Smoke Eater, seen in the top right, is quite effective for Beaudry, who says the cigar smell stays contained to just the room itself.

The slot machine sits next to one of Beaudry’s most adored items in the room, a 1970s Bernhardt bar. Though he bought the bar at a local auction for about $250, he says he’s had people online make offers into the thousands for it, but he won’t budge. There seems to be a rotating cast of items that top the bar, from a Timeless-branded ashtray from Ferio Tego to a vintage bar lamp and various figurines. An antique lamp with a yellow-gold hue appears to be the only permanent resident here. A gold-framed picture on the wall brings the bar area together; it features the classic black-and-white photo of Jack Nicholson holding a cigar and blowing a ring of smoke.

Every few weeks, there’s a local auction Beaudry likes to attend that’s full of rare items with tons of character, available at affordable prices. This is where he managed to get his hands on that Bernhardt bar, as well as the antique ashtray holders he has scattered around the room. The auction has been a local fixture for as long as Beaudry can remember and typically is supplied with items disposed of from local estates. It has helped facilitate Beaudry’s furnishing of the room, which he approaches as a continual work-in-progress. “It started as one thing and who knows where it’ll go as time progresses,” he says.

If there’s one double-edged sword with the cigar room, Beaudry says it would be the HVAC system, or lack thereof. The absence of the HVAC is obviously what partially kickstarted this whole process to begin with, but it also presents a problem in the winter. “You don’t have to worry about stinking up the house but at the same time, you don’t have climate control in there,” says Beaudry. He added a space heater to combat the issue, which he says gets to work in no time. Thankfully, warmer months are no issue. But overall, cold weather doesn’t make for ideal humidor storage conditions during the winter months. “I’d like to get a nice glass display humidor with lights so when you walk up to the room, you pick your cigar and just go right in,” he says. But for now, the climate-controlled humidor typically resides on the bar in the main basement area, and only occasionally finds its way inside the room off on the right-hand side atop a side table. 

Beaudry's room feels like a great spot to kick back with a smoke and a Bourbon. And as you can see, there is no shortage of whiskey here.

The introduction of Beaudry’s cigar room made him dive even deeper into Bourbon and other kinds of whisky. “I started buying different Bourbons and Scotches, and it became a little bit more of a collection,” says Beaudry. “I would say I’m like half a collector.” Based on what’s in the cigar room, it seems like Beaudry’s not doing too bad. There’s even a few Pappy Van Winkle bottles on the shelves, but Beaudry was quick to note that he didn’t buy them. As part of a business deal, Beaudry happily agreed to take a few Pappy bottles instead of a cash payment. 

It’s fitting that Beaudry’s Bourbon collection is prominently displayed in his cigar room, as it’s part of the bigger picture that attracts him to cigars—and has since the beginning. “You picture a dude grilling a big fat steak, smoking a cigar and drinking some Bourbon, and I was like well I got the steak, I got the Bourbon, maybe I’ll try a cigar,” says Beaudry. “There really wasn’t a person or a particular situation that got me into them.” Beaudry’s 10-year journey with cigars continually evolves, to the point where he generally smokes once or twice a week now. Of course, the cigar room only amplifies the frequency. “It’s a planned escape for me,” he says.

With Beaudry, his passion for cigars is deeply intertwined with cocktails and spirits, cooking and an overarching interest in the finer things, flavor profiles and craftsmanship. “My buddies make fun of me because every time they come over I’m making something fancy and I have the chilled glasses, different cherries and all these garnishes,” he says with a laugh. “The whole thing is just a collective hobby, the cigars, the food, the whisky, they all just incorporate themselves together.”

Not to be overshadowed by the Bourbon collection, the Jack Nicholson photo, the Bernhardt bar and the antique slot machine are just a few of Beaudry's other prized items in the space.

Beaudry estimates he has about 75 to 80 cigars on-hand now, and he’s always got a running list of cigars he eagerly wants to smoke. “I’m always buying new stuff. But I tend to let those stay in my humidor because for some reason I don’t want to smoke ‘em,” says Beaudry. He mentions Ashtons as one of his early, go-to brands, but says he’s constantly building up his knowledge base and exposure to cigar brands. “I like Davidoff Late Hour, Ferio Tego, CAO Amazon Basin, I’m all over the place,” he says.

Having buddies to share your smokes with certainly helps. For Beaudry, it’s typically a mix between solo visits to his cigar room and having his closest friend (who also lives in the neighborhood) over for a cigar—which usually leads to two. “Mostly it’s a place where he and I go to hangout and have a few drinks,” says Beaudry. “If it’s football season we watch sports, if not, we either just talk or watch a stand-up comedy or something.” Other times, a bigger crowd finds their way into the room. “We’ve had six, seven guys and even in other parts of the basement, you can’t even smell it,” he says, but notes four people in the room is the sweet spot.

Beaudry says he drew inspiration for his room from other cigar room stories, including the grand, lavish setup created by Tim Campbell in Illinois. Campbell not only shared his story with this magazine, but the YouTube video he did of his room has been viewed more than a million times. “Everybody who has a cigar lounge at home, that guy probably had something to do with it,” says Beaudry. While you can certainly see some similarities between Campbell and Beadury’s rooms from an aesthetic point of view, the two represent contrasting approaches to building cigar rooms. Campbell undoubtedly went all-in, using the hard-earned proceeds from the sale of his company to build the space of his dreams. Beaudry, who owns a Chesapeake Bay-based tent rental company with his wife called Eastern Shore Tents and Events, says the all-in point is somewhere down the road for him. Both cigar rooms are strong examples of the variety these spaces are capable of, whether it involves full commitment from the jump or a gradual process of curating and refining.

Beaudry, pictured here, demonstrates a great example of creating a cigar room in quick order, while continously improving bits and pieces as time goes on.

“It’s a place where I just sit down and don’t really do anything else,” says Beaudry, who admittedly is an individual who generally struggles to sit still. “I can sit there for three hours and be perfectly at peace with that.”

Source: https://www.cigaraficionado.com/article/delaware-cigar-and-bourbon-room-with-modern-vintage-appeal