Crimson Pursuits: London’s 21 Best Negronis

London may be a long way from Florence, but few cities outside Italy have embraced the Negroni with such gusto as London.

Here, the cocktail has become both ritual and rite of passage, a bitter-sweet hymn sung in gin, vermouth and Campari. If Milan gave us the aperitivo and Florence the formula, London has turned it into theatre, a performance played out nightly on polished bars and mirrored shelves.

It is no surprise that the high priests of this stage, Salvatore Calabrese and Agostino Perrone, maestros of the ruby elixir, have made a base in the city, each adding their own flourish of sprezzatura.

What follows is my (current) favourite London Negronis: 21 stops, 21 interpretations of the same eternal theme.

To drink them all would be folly. To attempt it in a single week could however be genius.

1. Bar Termini – Soho
The place every London Negroni begins and ends. A postage stamp of Italian chic, conjured by Tony Conigliaro and Marco Arrigo, where Negronis are aged in bottles and poured in demure stemmed glasses as though the act were sacrament. To perch at that marble counter, shoulder to shoulder with strangers, is to believe perfection can, in fact, be distilled.

2. Bar Lina – Soho
Hidden in plain sight under the long-loved deli, Lina Stores on Brewer Street, this hidden sibling is access by a secret door at the rear of the deli, and down the tight staircase beyond. The Negroni here is unapologetically classic, the sort of drink that could be served in Rome at midnight or Soho at six, its bitterness softened by Italian charm and unashamed mystique.

3. Do Not Disturb – Vintry & Mercer
A velvet-lined speakeasy in the City, part Prohibition fantasy, part subterranean den. Their Negroni is a dark, brooding thing, poured with the confidence of a bar that knows you don’t stumble upon it by chance. It whispers, conspiratorial, as you descend.

4. Mr Fogg’s Apothecary – Brook Street
Victorian eccentricity at full throttle. A fantasia of faux-scientific whimsy where the Negroni arrives in glassware resembling an alchemist’s tincture. Some find it absurd; I find it marvellous. After all, what is the Negroni if not the modern world’s most reliable remedy?

5. Amano – Covent Garden
Perched atop its namesake hotel, Amano serves Negronis with a skyline for company. The City glows beyond the glass while Berlin-meets-London sleekness hums within. The drink is as sharp and modern as the view: precise, unforgettable.

6. Vermuteria – King’s Cross
Part-café, part-shrine, bicycles hang from the ceiling and vermouth bottles line the walls. It feels smuggled from a sidestreet in Barcelona, yet sits neatly in Coal Drops Yard. Their Negroni is vermouth-forward, unfussy, continental, proof that simplicity, when done with conviction, can taste like genius.

7. The Connaught Bar – Mayfair
Agostino Perrone conducts cocktails here like symphonies. His Negroni, stirred tableside with house bitters, is high theatre in hushed tones. This is the Savile Row suit of Negronis: impeccable, bespoke, indecently smooth. Mayfair melting into Milan, equally finely dressed.

8. Carlotta – Marylebone
Flamboyant as la dolce vita itself. Bold décor, red banquettes, chatter rising with each plate of pasta. The Negroni here is not just a cocktail but a declaration: stay a little longer, order another dish, let midnight take care of itself.

9. The American Bar – The Savoy
The cathedral. Sinatra drank here, Monet painted from its windows, and the Negroni has long been mixed beneath its mirrored canopy. To raise a glass in this room is to join the roll call of history. The drink flawless, the atmosphere eternal.

10. Scarfes Bar – The Rosewood
Velvet armchairs, Gerald Scarfe’s wicked caricatures, and bartenders who pour with a wink. The Negroni is as rich as the surroundings, luxurious yet witty, faintly conspiratorial. A bar that knows exactly how glamorous London should feel.

11. Goldfinch – Tooting
A neighbourhood bar with swagger, South London’s best-kept secret. The Finch Negroni leans on cassis for depth, a leaner pour that sings in balance. It is the chalk line of cocktails: elegant, precise, quietly brilliant.

12. Forza Wine – Peckham
A rooftop perch with views that roll across the city. Here Negronis wear seasonal coats, I have tried both the plum-bruised Campari in autumn and the sour cherry vermouth in summer. Playful without being faddish, best drunk as the sun slips away and the skyline blushes to match your glass.

13. Duck & Waffle – Bishopsgate
Forty floors up, London spread beneath you. Their Ristretto Negroni folds in 24-hour coffee drip, bean bitterness arm-in-arm with Campari’s bark. Stirred over a single sculpted cube of ice, it is both cocktail and souvenir: the city seen differently once you descend.

14. The Gibson – Old Street
A bar that revels in eccentricity, often serving drinks in glassware resembling Fabergé eggs. Their Negroni, despite the theatre, is deadly serious: precise, balanced, respectful of the rules even as it toys with breaking them.

15. Swift – Soho
Upstairs for spritz, downstairs for serious business. The Neroni is definitely a downstairs choice. Head to the cellar, candlelight glowing as the Negroni sharpens its teeth. Intimate, moody, bitter in all the right ways. Soho at its sultriest.

16. Donovan Bar – Brown’s Hotel, Mayfair
Here presides Salvatore Calabrese, “The Maestro,” whose hands have stirred more Negronis than most of us will sip in a lifetime. The Donovan Bar is sleek, discreet, but with Calabrese at the helm it becomes temple and theatre combined. His Negroni is liquid authority: classic, commanding, unforgettable.

17. Negroni Bar by Campari – Monument
An altar in scarlet, upholstered in velvet and shadow. Campari themselves here hold court, serving nothing but Negronis and their myriad offspring: white, barrel-aged, frozen. Homage and theatre at once, it is London’s first true shrine to the ruby classic.

18. Dukes Bar – St. James’s
Whispered about in tones of reverence, Dukes is where James Bond’s martini was stirred into legend. But under Alessandro Palazzi’s gaze, the Negroni takes on similar gravitas, prepared with the same ceremony, poured from frosted bottles, never hurried. Here, the drink is less aperitif than sacrament.

19. Claridge’s Bar – Mayfair
Polish and pedigree ooze from the art deco surrounds, where Negronis gleam in cut-crystal glasses. Subtle variations rule, a whisper of orange blossom, a sigh of aged vermouth, keep tradition alive while nodding to innovation. Claridge’s is the cocktail dressed in Savile Row tailoring.

20. Artesian – Langham Hotel
Once crowned best bar in the world, Artesian still treats cocktails as performance art. Their Negroni riffs arrive in unexpected vessels, smoked, twisted, occasionally theatrical, but the heart of bitter, sweet, strong remains unbroken. A Negroni here is less about what’s in the glass than the memory it leaves behind.

21. Rules – Covent Garden
London’s oldest restaurant wears its history proudly, and the Negroni at the bar tastes as though it has been quietly perfecting itself since 1798. Rich, balanced, no nonsense, it is a Negroni for grown-ups, best taken before a plate of game or oysters.

London, then, is no mere outpost for the Negroni but its adopted capital, a city where Campari’s hum has been woven into its nightlife. Florence may claim paternity, but it is in London that maestros like Perrone and Calabrese have raised the drink to opera. Twenty-one stops prove the point: one cocktail, infinite interpretations, each sip a standing ovation.

“Florence may have birthed it, but London has made the Negroni its nightly opera.”