Artesian

Artesian holds a record that may never be broken: four consecutive years as the best bar in the world, from 2012 to 2015. No other bar has managed that run, and the team behind it, Alex Kratena and Simone Caporale, became the most imitated bartenders of their generation on the strength of it.

The room sits inside The Langham on Portland Place and has barely changed since. High ceilings, bay windows, a long back bar and the purple leather that turns up in every photograph of the place. It is grand in the Victorian hotel manner rather than the Art Deco one, which makes it feel different from the Mayfair bars it is usually compared with.

The Kratena era was defined by drinks that behaved like installations, served in bespoke vessels with theatrical presentation, and that style has since spread across the world and been somewhat overtaken by it. What remains is a bar with genuinely serious technique and one of the most comfortable rooms in London to spend three hours in.

Worth knowing: Kratena went on to open Tayer + Elementary, which took the World’s 50 Best crown in a completely different register. Drinking at both in one week is a decent short history of where cocktail bars have gone since 2015.

Our verdict: the most decorated bar of the 2010s, and still one of the grandest rooms in London for a long, unhurried drink.

Go if: you want hotel-bar comfort with a serious list. Skip if: you want somewhere current rather than historic.

The Langham, Portland Place, Marylebone.