At a newly opened New York restaurant and several London hotel bars, the artist’s work gives a unique character to the entire cocktail menu. The impulse is old: Since Bellini, bartenders have named drinks after painters. But it’s becoming systematic: as recipes change, a family collection or an artist’s archive is becoming a constant source of ideas. The approach is not limited to those two cities, but New York and London, art market capitals where hotels tend to hang serious collections, are reinforcing the approach into a menu-level idea. The timing is no accident: High-end bars compete to feel like more than just a room with an impressive menu, and a series of menus that provide perspective on the entire menu. Some bartenders find names and visual affinity for the cocktails they’ve developed. Others let the image guide the contents of the glass.
Miroo Kim, former bar manager Atomic mixera Korean fine-dining restaurant in New York that now oversees the cocktail menu Romya new restaurant in Soho, opened on September 29th. Her recipe was already complete when the team learned that the restaurant would showcase the work of American painter George Condo.
“Cocktails actually come first,” King told the Observer. The same day the team began discussing names, her brown butter caragielo (a cocktail of coffee and wine) became “Internal Disturbance,” a title shared between a 2020 apartment painting and his 2020-21 New York exhibition. Romy occupies the former Little Prince space at 199 Princes Street, where interior designer Rafael de Cárdenas framed the artwork with crimson and black lacquered paneling, burlwood and a leopard-print rug. Condo’s portraits allow joy and pain to share a broken face, which he called “psychological Cubism.” Kim looks for images and titles that resonate with her recipes. “I don’t want it to feel like we’re just going through a list of apartment names and picking the ones that sound good,” she said.
Internal Riot’s cacao tequila and coffee have a dark, roasted character that Kim associates with the image of the Condo. The title plays on her joke about caffeine and wine: “You put wine and coffee together, and they’re two things that have very different effects on your body at the same time.” Her lychee martini, Mary Annette, is named after Condo’s 2003 painting. The title reminds Kim of 18th-century French queen Marie Antoinette, an association that goes well with the drink’s coconut oil-washed vodka and pink lychee fudge. She also noticed a visual similarity, with the nearly opaque white drink served in a tall, delicate glass through which the fudge casts a faint pink hue. Drink titles are drawn from Condo’s wider archive; the works selected for the restaurant are Blue Rodrigo (2009) and Bewildered Man (2025). “It’s more like it gives us a language to name them and, in some cases, bring out the personality that’s already in the drink,” she said.
The Bellini cocktail provides a familiar precedent: In 1948, Giuseppe Cipriani, founder harry’s bar In Venice, he named his blend of white peach puree and Italian sparkling wine Prosecco after the Renaissance painter Giovanni Bellini. In 2022, at the Baccarat Hotel in New York, bar manager Mark Tubridy used the hotel bar’s collection to create his L’Art du Cocktail menu. “Dark Sky” echoes ominous clouds against a pale backdrop and is paired with cinnamon oat milk and dark rum, a twist on the classic rum-ginger beer “Dark N’ Stormy.”
At London’s One Aldwych hotel, the lobby bar’s second gallery menu pairs cocktails with pieces from its collection. Artist Richard Bartle’s beach scenes provide the starting point for a currant margarita made with tequila, currant eau-de-vie (a clear fruit brandy) and elderflower. The menu also indicates where guests can find original artwork, bringing the collectibles into the experience of ordering a drink.
The 2026 pop-up store is located at Frieze MastersLondon’s historic art fair, Ham Yard Hotel’s Liquid Art menu includes the Sculptural Mule. The drink is inspired by the bronze group portraits created by Liverpool-born sculptor Tony Cragg in the hotel’s Soho courtyard. The premise of drawing setting is Scarf,in Rosewood London Hotel in Holborn. The pub is named after British cartoonist Gerald Scarfe, whose political cartoons tarnished his reputation and created disturbing images for British rock band Pink Floyd’s “The Wall” album and film. His paintings line the room with velvet chairs and bookshelves, and a fireplace provides a distinctly civilized setting for all the brazen provocation.
Scarfes’ Heroes & Villains menu, launched in April, draws on Scarfe’s book and exhibition of the same name. The 20 cocktails represent 10 characters, each of which is revealed through a hidden lever. The menu incorporates Scarfe’s satirical approach to mixology itself, pairing restrained recipes with more luxurious ones. For Andy Loudon, bar director at London’s Rosewood Hotel, Charles Darwin’s pairing explores the distance between the British naturalist and his caricatures. The Natural Selection is a whiskey highball infused with raspberries, carrots and dry fino sherry. Evolution is inspired by an overdose of Zombie, a potent rum cocktail using bourbon, pistachio almond syrup (a sweet nutty syrup) and tart pineapple. Loudon describes its evolution as “more ingredients, more textures, more indulgence, and absolutely no interest in moderation.”
In a bar, getting these personalities to have a drink doesn’t have to be that romantic of a job. Loudon’s team tests the infusion’s extraction time and adjusts the liqueur’s sugar and acidity before trying each version of the cocktail itself, a process that can run for dozens of iterations. “If an element enhances the narrative but detracts from the drinking experience, then it will be refined, simplified or removed entirely,” he said. How much of that work reaches the table depends on the guest. Some people want a 20-second introduction; others welcome a three-minute introduction to a character or the technology behind a recipe. “For me, it’s important to provide the team with building blocks rather than scripts,” Loudon said. “I didn’t want the service to feel rehearsed or repetitive.”
All in all, these bars are all about the same thing: maintaining the magic of art long after opening night. When Romy’s recipe changes, Kim can revisit Condo’s archives. At One Aldwych, the menu takes guests back to the range that inspired their drinks. Loudon’s team incorporated Scarfe’s sarcasm into flavors and then tested whether the idea could improve cocktails. “Stories can inspire drinks, but taste has to win,” he says. While the clever references may prompt a second look, this kind of pleasure requires no footnotes.
