London’s Lyaness Wins the World’s Best Bar Award at Tales of the Cocktail

The experimental cocktail joint by Ryan Chetiyawardana was a big winner at the 16th annual Spirited Awards

The interior of Lyaness, the world's best bar winner at the Spirited Awards at Tales of the Cocktail
The interior of London's Lyaness, a big winner at this year's Spirited Awards
Lyaness

London’s Lyaness was the big winner at the 16th annual Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Awards, taking home the World’s Best Bar honor.

The awards, held Thursday night in New Orleans, also honored Lyaness as the Best International Hotel Bar and the Washington DC-based Silver Lyan at the Riggs (all created by Ryan Chetiyawardana, aka Mr Lyan) as Best U.S. Hotel Bar. London-based speakeasies picked up five of the eight international awards.

Overlooking the Thames along Southbank London, Lyaness is an experimental cocktail bar with a menu sectioned around ingredients instead of cocktails — their current selection, for example, features several drinks made from malt and grass amazake and interesting ingredient combinations like the Marigold Gimlet (Bacardi Ocho, Oyster Honey, white verjus, brioche, apple blossom).

“We always make the offering unique to the space, the timing, and what is currently exciting us, so this means it’s always about continuing to innovate,” Chetiyawardana told us back in 2020, just before Silver Lyan at the Riggs opened. “The product for Super Lyan at the Kimpton De Witt is specific to Amsterdam, and the same goes for Cub and for Lyaness at Sea Containers London, so we use what surrounds us as a springboard for ideas.”

If you’re not planning on going overseas anytime soon, you can find the Best U.S. Cocktail Bar in New York, as Katana Kitten took home that honor (along with two other awards).

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