In Montauk, Sunday is the Best Night to Party

There is no room in summer for Sunday Scaries

I have now spent a few weekends in Montauk this summer, and Sunday night has emerged as the best party night.

For context, it used to be impossible even to get dinner after 9 pm on Sunday night in Montauk. The choices were John’s Drive-In for chicken nuggets or 7/11 for frozen pizza (Fun fact: Montauk’s 7/11 is the highest grossing one in the country.)

Now, you can eat, drink, dance, party all night, basically until work starts Monday morning. And the crowd is older (in a good way) and more local.

The action starts at sunset where the scene-y influencer crowd heads to Surf Lodge to listen to the big-name DJ that night. Families and those feeling more low-key head to Salivar’s, a family-owned clam and chowder house in the harbor that hosts a talented cover band (The Bird, a restaurant in town with insanely creative cocktails, also does live music on Sundays once a month.)

The crowd converges at Montauk Project that feels more like Ibiza than the Hamptons. Beautiful men and women, wearing skin-tight dresses, aloha shirts, and sunglasses, dance around the DJ booth. The bar is three-layers deep with people ordering rounds of martinis and negronis. Strangers actually meet one another - and flirt - around the outside fire pits.

The Montauk Project opened quietly late last summer across from the train station in the former Roberta’s space. It’s a collaboration between Bryan Seekamp, who claims his family has been doing business in the Hamptons for 14 generations, and Sam Berkson, who was General Manager of the Gold Bar in Nolita. The duo said they wanted a space for people in their 30s and 40s that would be open every night of the week, and they have delivered (well almost… the bar is closed on Tuesdays.)

At 2 am the party moves to Dive Bar Pizza, a graffiti-clad hole-in-the-wall on the harbor. During the day it’s famous for its clam pizza, but on Sundays the crowd is more interested in drinking and playing pool than eating. The party ends when the bartender says so, which last Sunday was 4 am.

My guess is Sundays have become so popular because Friday and Saturdays are so packed. Locals and millennials - the people who can afford housing on a Sunday night - go nuts when everyone else packs into trains and Jitneys to go back to the city. Sunday partying also feels more carefree.

Bonus content: I found a place in Montauk that serves $12 martinis and am naming it under the paywall.

Have a good week!