Cigar Aficionado

Every cigar room has its own origin story, unique unto itself. While all are born out of unfettered ion, the tipping point that causes a person to commit to his or her long-held fantasy seems to vary quite a bit. For Rodrigo Rompeltien of Santiago, Chile, enough was enough. As a longtime cigar smoker living in a city with few indoor options for cigar smokers, Rompeltien had lost his patience for weathering the great outdoors. He finally decided to bring a cigar lounge to his house. He ended up with a space that seamlessly merges elegance, strength and relaxation into one gorgeous smoking hideout—plus, it houses a remarkable cigar collection.

Life as a cigar smoker in Santiago is not easy, at least when it comes to finding a comfortable place to smoke. The South American city, boarded by the Andes Mountains, isn’t exactly a tropical retreat. The cold winters don’t make for habitable cigar-smoking conditions. Outdoor terraces and patios can only suffice for so long, and the only place to smoke indoors indoors is at the city's La Casa del Habano. “So basically, the only place to smoke is your house, or a friend's house,” says Rompeltien. “As a cigar smoker for the last 18 years, I got sick of that. So I said ‘ok, let’s do something about it.’”

About four years ago, Rompeltien got to work. Now, he finds that his spot is a commonly sought-after reprieve for much of his local cigar-smoking friends. “Everybody’s married here and I’ve met very few wives that will allow you to smoke indoors at the house,” says Rompeltien with a laugh. “I’m the only one to have a place where it’s allowed for me to smoke.” Having two RabbitAir humidors inside his room surely helps on that front. And Rompeltien takes pride in having such a personal sanctuary, which he says isn't very common in Chile.

The full build, from start to finish, took about six months, but Rompeltien refers to it as a “work-in-progress” that’s consistently growing and evolving. Construction involved a patchwork team of contractors and Rompeltien himself. “The main construction, like walls, electricity, I did with contractors,” says Rompeltien. “Everything else, like putting the floor and decorating, of course, I did myself.” The entire room is roughly 100 square meters in size (or 1,000 square feet). Rompeltien considers the space “something in between” a cigar lounge and a cigar room, based on the dimensions. 

Rompeltien’s cigar space is connected to the side of his house. It takes the place of what used to be a three-car, “drive-thru” garage, which Rompeltien says are common in Chile. He tore down the walls of an extra space that sat between the kitchen and the garage, ing it with the latter, and from here he framed and closed up the space, cemented the floor, and eventually, had a full-fledged, impressive cigar room on his hands. “It’s nothing huge or too fancy,” he says, “but I think it’s still pretty nice with a masculine vibe to it.”

Entry into Rompeltien’s smoking paradise isn’t exactly straightforward. “It’s kind of camouflage,” he says, referring to the somewhat secret, white cabinet door that leads to the room via the kitchen. “It’s funny because you open it and you’re expecting a closet with dishes and everything, but then you open and this whole lounge opens to your eyes,” says Rompeltien. “When everybody goes inside, I get a big shock like ‘hey, where’d this come from?’”

After the surprise factor wears off, it won’t take long for a visitor to process exactly where they are. Just through the door, you’ll reach a very short corridor in which you’re flanked by two large, closet-sized humidors on either side. Both are filled to the brim with cigar boxes, with plenty of smokes at the ready to grab on your walk in. Across the way, straight ahead on the far side of the room, an imposing, yet calming, stone wall is sure to grab your attention. It’s Rompeltien’s favorite part of the room. 

When Rompeltien embarked on his cigar room project, he only had table top humidors to store his smokes, but he soon realized his space deserved an upgrade. “Since it's such a nice place, I was like ‘why don’t we build a small walk-in humidor?’” says Rompeltien. “And it was a hit, everybody loved it and so we did another one, and now I have three of them.” 

All three come lined with lights inside and have little room for any more cigars, but each is different from the other. The two in the corridor are closet humidors. The one on the right-hand side is technically a walk-in humidor that sits behind a glass door with enough room for one person to enter at a time. Over on the left, a bigger humidor is guarded by French doors, though it’s not large enough to physically enter. As you through the corridor, just around the corner to the left on the near side of the wall, is Rompeltien’s third humidor, which is built into the wall and is about the size of a mini fridge. 

Once you through the short corridor and into the room itself, a small gathering area is there to greet you, complete with three armed chairs facing one another around a small circular table in the middle. This is one of the several spots one can enjoy a cigar in the room, allowing some variability depending on the context. For example, if you want to sit down with a book or simply have a good vantage point to kick back and observe, over on the left side in the corner just near the built-in wall humidor, sits a light blue chair with its own table and a lamp beside it. Back in the center of the room, past the initial gathering area, is plenty of couch seating for those looking to settle in and relax. A brown leather sectional couch reaches over to the right corner of the room and it’s accompanied by a brown leather loveseat off on the left that faces in towards the glass coffee table in the middle.

All attention is directed towards the alluring stonewall, within which, in a built-in enclave, sits a flatscreen TV. A tall, skinny speaker also stands off to the left. Lately, Rompeltien says he’s been utilizing this section of the room quite often to enjoy the NBA Playoffs. The nightly games have been a welcomed partner to his cigars, even though his team, the Brooklyn Nets, fell short of making the playoff cut this year. For those more musically inclined, an electric keyboard awaits you over on the left side of the room. 

Finding the proper pairing for your cigar shouldn’t be much of an issue here either, assuming you enjoy coffee and whisky. Rompeltien keeps a coffee machine on a table behind the couch, which he turns to some nights to avoid always having whisky with his nightly smokes. But some nights simply call for indulgence, and over on the right-hand side of the room, a beautiful bar and liquor cabinet sits fully stocked with whiskies from around the globe. 

Rompeltien carries an irably diverse selection of whisky, including Scotch and Japanese whisky. He also has a selection of American whiskies such as Bourbon, a category he says is somewhat rare in his home country. He uses visits to the states as an opportunity to build up his Bourbon inventory and try new brands. Rompeltien says the whisky collection predates the cigar room, but naturally decided to incorporate a bar area into the space. “It’s like bread and butter,” he says. Some of the highlights in his collection include Eagle Rare, Laphroaig, Dalmore, Balvenie and Mitcher’s, to name a few. 

The flooring of the room is finished with hardwood, with several ornate rugs spread throughout the space. The walls are painted in a subdued, rust gold color that perfectly accents wooden floors and furnishings as well as the brown leather chairs and, of course, the stone wall. The latter of which is the defining characteristic of the room, giving the space a unique, masculine feel.

There’s no shortage of lighting in this space either, whether it naturally flows in through the windows that flank either side of the room or via the several lamps and built-in lights throughout the room. The varied sources provide a diversity of options, though the space is perhaps best suited for dim, warm lighting.  

Rompeltien pointed to the decor in particular as an aspect of the room that’s still a work-in-progress, but for now, a multitude of gorgeous clocks, ashtrays and tabletop humidors take up much of the real estate available on the room’s surfaces. The walls bear an assortment of framed prints, paintings and even a wooden tribal mask. He also has some lanyards hanging up from past PCA events, which he has attended in hopes of learning the ropes, discovering new brands and developing relationships. He also used the trip as an opportunity to visit several Vegas lounges to gather ideas on elements he can incorporate into his own spot.

Work-in-progress or not, the room certainly gets its fair share of attention. As for how often Rompeltien uses the room, “every single day,” he says, without a moment of hesitation. As someone keenly aware of the difficulties his local area provides cigar smokers, Rompeltien is not stingy with his space. “It’s basically for my personal use and my friends, of course,” he says, noting his buddies come over, on average, about twice a week.

When you have the kind of cigar collection Rompeltien has, you’d feel compelled to share with others as well. After 18 years of smoking cigars, he’s built up quite a collection, 5,000 or so by his estimates. “A lot of those years were Cuban cigars. A lot of the knowledge we had was of Cuban cigars,” he says, noting the lack of an embargo between Cuba and Latin America. But lately, his palate has started to expand. “When I was opened to the New World cigars, it’s just such a bigger market and brands,” he says. “You’re going to tell me I’m crazy, but I prefer more New World cigars than Cubans.” As long as Cuban cigar prices remain high, Rompeltien says he’s more than happy sticking to smokes from Nicaragua, Honduras and the Dominican Republic.

Since the beginning, cigars have been a point of pure curiosity and fascination for Rompeltien, who considers himself “self-taught” in the cigar world. No one person introduced him to cigars, there was no “light bulb moment.” For him, he can only seeing someone smoking in the movies and being drawn to a character with cigars. “I said to myself ‘someday I’m going to get my hands on one of those cigars,’” he says. 

As for his favorite smoke, Rompeltien likes to keep an open-mind.  “There’s so many, I love the classic big brands, you know Padrón, Fuente, Davidoff, Rocky Patel and a lot of smaller ones,” he says. “One I really love that’s starting to get big is Aladino.”

Since putting in the cigar room, Rompeltien’s collection has expanded quite a bit, so much so that he started getting into the business of selling cigars directly from his at-home spot. “I actually kind of started a small business because of this,” he says. “Like I said, there’s only one place here to buy cigars, so I said ‘hey, there’s opportunity here.’” Rompeltien will even bring prospective customers to his lounge to share a smoke and conduct business, though he says he’s just in the beginning stages. About half of his massive inventory he has designated for the business side, the rest are for his personal stash. 

Despite the impressive collection and cigar room, Rompeltien is modest when describing his space. He was quick to note that his cherished smoking hideout was not born out of money, but  “for the love of cigars.” 

“It’s cigar-oriented, it’s not just a man cave,” he says. “It was designed and thought of for smoking cigars.”

Do you have a cigar room worth sharing? Send us a note and some pictures at [email protected].

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