The hotel bar that makes the best martini in London, according to expert bartenders

Martinis are having a massive main character moment right now.

Gone are the stuffy James Bond connotations; in London the martini is the tipple du jour, with icy coups stuffed with olives appearing in the Instagram photo dumps of all the city’s coolest people. Charli xcx just hosted her wedding afterparty in a Dalston bar known for serving £8 ones. 

Many of London’s drinkers will claim to know the best place for sipping the timeless bevvy, but if it’s done wrong it can leave you trying to chug down a glass of tepid gin (or vodka) while wondering what all the fuss is about. So to find out where exactly is the best, Time Out asked seven bar experts, including Tayer + Elementary’s Monica Berg, Lyaness’ Mr Lyan, and Coral Anderson of Swift, to nominate the best martini in the city. Here’s what they said. 

According to the bar experts, London’s very best martini can be found at the Connaught Hotel. This uber swish Mayfair hotel has several bars, two of which were nominated by our cocktail professionals for having the best martinis in town.

First up was the hotel’s famous Connaught Bar, recommended by co-founder of Hackney bar Equal Parts, Carina Soto Velásquez. This bougie art deco haunt often tops world’s best bars lists, and has been known for slinging martinis served from a very posh trolley since it opened in 2008.

‘The Connaught Bar makes an incredible classic martini,’ said Soto Velásquez. ‘All the work they do around the martinis there is brilliant. The classic gin martini with a lemon twist is gorgeous.’

Also nominated was the Connaught Hotel’s Coburg Bar, the quieter and smaller sibling to the Connaught Bar, which Three Sheets’ Max Venning said served up London’s number one martini. 

More low-key than the grand main bar, punters are more likely to nab a table at the Coburg than the often full Connaught Bar. ‘I like to sit outside in the atrium. It’s really bright and airy and you can look over Mount Street,’ Venning said.   

Venning’s go-to order is a dry vodka martini with a twist, made with Belvedere. ‘It’s really crisp, and nice and stirred down with good dilution.’

As for the runners up, perhaps London’s most famous martini spot, Dukes Bar at Dukes Hotel in Mayfair was nominated by Monica Berg, while Rita’s co-owners Missy Flynn and Gabriel Pryce recommended the Martini Bar at Egerton House Hotel – another Mayfair establishment. Mr Lyan’s favourite was Waltz Bar, an intimate and new Japanese cocktail joint in Shoreditch serving a ‘nice version of a Gibson’. Exale Brewing’s Stephanie Randle-Solley chose the plush new Shoreditch resto and bar One Club Row, while Coral Anderson’s pick for London’s best martini was at Satan’s Whiskers, a Bethnal Green cocktail bar known for serving top-notch classics. 

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