The Best Gin Bars in New York

Dave Arnold's West Village bar uses centrifuge-clarified spirits and rapid-infusion techniques that produce cocktails of unusual clarity and precision. The gin program is not the largest in New York but it is the most technically considered — the house-infused and clarified gin expressions they serve are made in-house and represent genuine creative thinking about what the spirit can do. Reservations are recommended and often essential.

Order: The gin and tonic made with their house rapid-infused botanical gin — the clarity of the spirit is demonstrably different from anything commercial and the drink is cleaner as a result.

Named World's Best Bar in 2019 and still operating at the level that distinction implies. Dante's gin selection is wide rather than deep, but the Negroni program — over twenty variations on the classic template, each using a different gin as its structural anchor — is the most intelligent use of gin selection we have seen in New York. The terrace is the best outdoor seat in the Village on a good evening.

Order: The Negroni Sbagliato variation featuring Monkey 47 — it is an improvement on the original and makes the argument for complexity over convention.

The multiple World's Best Bar-listed Dead Rabbit maintains one of the most comprehensive gin selections in New York — over 150 expressions — with particular emphasis on Irish and American craft gins that do not appear on most lists. The cocktail menu changes seasonally and consistently features gin as a primary spirit in the most creative drinks. The upstairs parlour has a quieter atmosphere than the ground floor taproom.

Order: Whatever gin-based punch is currently on the menu — they produce genuinely excellent large-format serves that are shared rather than individual, and the gin combinations are always considered.

Leyenda is primarily known for its agave and rum programs, but head bartender Ivy Mix's approach to gin — incorporating it into cocktails alongside Latin American spirits in ways that treat gin as a component rather than a category — produces drinks that justify the trip to Carroll Gardens. The outdoor space is one of the better warm-weather drinking spots in Brooklyn. Go on a Tuesday when the pace is more relaxed.

Order: The gin and pisco sour variation, if it is on the seasonal menu — the combination is unusual and the balance is correct.

The distillery that makes Dorothy Parker Gin and Perry's Tot Navy Strength operates a tasting room in Williamsburg where you can drink the spirits in the building where they are made, which is worth more as an experience than most bar-hopping exercises. The Dorothy Parker is genuinely distinctive — made with hibiscus among other botanicals — and the Navy Strength is one of the better high-proof gins available in the US. Tours on weekends.

Order: A Martini made with Perry's Tot Navy Strength — the higher proof changes the drink's texture in ways that justify the extra cost.

The renovated 1950s diner in Cobble Hill does not market itself as a gin bar and would probably be confused by the designation. But the Martini here — made by bartenders who consider the ratio, the dilution, and the choice of gin with the kind of seriousness that the drink deserves — is one of the finest in New York. The gin selection is not large but every bottle is there because someone chose it specifically. The food is excellent and unfussy.

Order: The house Martini, Gibson variation, with Plymouth gin. Ask them to explain the garnish ratio. They have views on this.

Primarily a whiskey destination, the Flatiron Room maintains a gin section that reflects the same collecting mentality as its acclaimed Scotch and bourbon lists. Around 80 gins organised by style and provenance, with a particular emphasis on aged expressions — barrel-rested gins that reveal what happens to juniper when you apply the same treatment as whiskey. One of the few bars in New York where you can drink aged gin as a serious category.

Order: A barrel-aged gin served neat alongside the same unaged expression — the comparison demonstrates why the category is worth taking seriously.

The tiki bar in the East Village uses gin in its cocktail program in ways that the traditional Mai Tai generation would not recognise. Several of the house cocktails use gin as the base spirit beneath tropical modifiers, and the results are both delicious and genuinely different from what you would order in a conventional gin bar. The room itself — volcanic rock walls, controlled low lighting — is one of the most atmospheric in the East Village.

Order: The Fog Cutter variation made with gin base — their version replaces the traditional rum structure with gin, which produces a cleaner drink that lets the citrus and orgeat work differently.

New York's most famous hidden bar operates through a phone booth entrance behind a hot dog shop and has been doing so since 2007. The gin selection is not the reason to come — the cocktail list is — but the team's approach to gin-based classics is impeccable, and the Martini program in particular reflects the kind of attention to detail that the drinks in that room deserve. Reservations by phone only, from 3pm on the day.

Order: A Bee's Knees — gin, lemon, honey syrup. Simple, classic, and executed at a level that makes you reassess how many bars get it wrong.

Named after the spice and built around a cocktail philosophy that foregrounds unusual botanicals, Mace makes gin an obvious fit for its approach. The cocktail list is organised by primary botanical rather than base spirit, which means the gin drinks sit alongside cognac and mezcal drinks that share the same flavour logic. One of the most original approaches to cocktail menu design in New York, and one of the better East Village rooms to spend an evening.

Order: Whatever gin cocktail leads with an unexpected botanical — their use of grains of paradise, cubeb pepper, and cassia alongside juniper produces drinks that expand the category rather than illustrate it.