When we sit down with Daniel Tuivaiti at Sunsets Rooftop in Kangaroo Point, it’s Friday September 1, the day before Riverfire. It’s lunchtime and the place is packed – a common sight ever since the elevated bar and eatery opened on Thursday August 24.

A C-17 Globemaster III and a Boeing EA-18G Growler practice their flyover routes ahead of the following night’s festivities, and though our conversation is punctuated by the deafening roar of aircraft soaring overhead, one can’t help but get excited at the sheer spectacle guests will experience once the action is truly underway.

Daniel and his partner Katrina Mead knew they had something good on their hands when they first spied the vacant rooftop site online, but even their boldest predictions failed to match reality. “After the amount of [pre-opening] hype we received, we kind of knew that this could much bigger than what we imagined,” says Dan. “We expected maybe a couple hundred people through the first weekend, but we had over a thousand covers.”

Having secured the lease to the site in March last year, the Sunsets ownership team (comprised of the Tuivaiti, Mead and Hartley families) have had a long time to mentally simulate every scenario – both good and disastrous. Looking at Sunsets in full flight, however, it’s hard to imagine it would ever be anything other than warmly received.

The rooftop oasis, located atop the summit of Linton Apartments, is an eye-catching, desert inspired locale tastefully accoutred with sand-toned tiling, low-set couches, woven lamp shades, sun-bleached timber furnishings and bar top, cacti gardens and gold accents. Boasting north-facing views of The City’s skyline and even a bird’s eye view into The Gabba over the road, Sunsets has claim to angles that you can’t get at other rooftop bars.

“It was going to be more Ibiza-inspired with white tones, but when we got the travertine tiles we decided to build around that,” says Dan, who spearheaded the design and fit-out effort alongside Grant Hartley. “We wanted [Sunsets] to be relaxing and calming, and we thought nothing does that better than timber, stone and organic materials.” Loosely divided into distinct sections (called Mesa, Dunes and Terrace), Sunsets can be sectioned for private functions (Daniel and Katrina boast experience in that area, running popular Merci Event Space in Hawthorne).