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Connaught Bar

London

Exquisite drinking in the quintessential hotel bar

It's hard to imagine a bar whose greatness inspires more consensus than Connaught Bar. Its ranking record in The 50 is an appearance in 17 of 18 lists – unmatched by any bar globally, ever.

This ​quintessential cocktail bar of The Connaught Hotel in London appeals to the heart and the mind. Its cocktails are near unimpeachable – a few of its signatures are genuine neo-classics – and the hospitality is as warm as it is indiscriminate. Mayfair is the land of millionaires, and if you're a guest of Connaught Bar, you become one for a night. If it's your first time visiting, hail the passing martini trolley for a personalised experience that's become a cocktail world rite of passage. You can choose your spirit and also the house bitters – think bergamot and ginseng, tonka bean, lavender, coriander seed or cardamom. The elixir is then 'thrown' before you from mixing glass to martini glass, the liquid cascading through the air, briefly kissing the mist of an expressed lemon peel. 

Elsewhere in the Masterpieces section – the bar's a 'best of' that dates to Connaught Bar's launch in 2008 – there's the Bloody Mary, which might just be best in class. The Faraway Collins, Number 11 and Mulata Daisy are all hits, but for something new the BRB is a melon-spiked paloma and the Classic Maiora a coconut-laced negroni.

The bar's leader, Ago Perrone, has been at the helm for almost two decades and at this point is as inseparable from the bar as the bar is from him. Under his – and creative accomplice Giorgio Bargiani's (named the Altos Bartenders' Bartender Award winner at the first edition of The 50 Best Bars Europe) – leadership, Connaught Bar remains a class act. 

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