In the hushed, labyrinthine alleys of Venice’s Dorsoduro district, a quiet revolution in cocktail storytelling is underway. Inside the Il Palazzo Experimental hotel, Experimental Cocktail Club (ECC) Venice has unveiled its latest creation: a new cocktail menu titled A Venetian Journey: Tales of Taste, launched last month. It isn’t just a menu — it’s a map to faraway bars and late-night whispers, an invitation to taste the world through the canals of Venice.
Bar Manager Pietro Lorefiece and his team have crafted a series of cocktails that read like love letters to global bar culture, each inspired by a different city and a friend in the worldwide bartending family. Seasonal, locally sourced ingredients anchor each drink firmly in Venetian soil, yet each sip drifts somewhere else — to Tokyo’s neon buzz, Mexico City’s earthy pulse, or London’s moody underground.
Among the standouts: K-pop Soda from Tokyo’s Soko Bar, a riot of Altamura Vodka, shiso shochu, Mancino Sakura, limoncello, and lychee — as if the city’s hyperpop spirit slipped into your glass. There’s Cream Fu Panda from Edinburgh’s Panda & Sons, lush and decadent with Brugal 1888, Mr. Black, cream, mint, and chocolate. Thalassa, born in Athens’ Avra bar, is all Mediterranean sunlight, mixing Hendrick’s Gin, Mastiha, fig leaf soda, dill, and chili. And for the wanderers craving a Mexican echo, Aguachile from Mexico City’s Selva electrifies with mezcal, amaretto, leche de tigre, and mole negro.
Non-alcoholic creations aren’t an afterthought here. Stuadoro, inspired by Aman, leans into bitter greens and briny edges with Amàrico Americano, fresh mint, and rocket. Meanwhile, Santa Regina, nodding to St. Regis, is an umami-rich blend of Martini Vibrant, hop aromatics, and ripe tomato — a cocktail that tastes like a secret garden at dusk.
The experience is matched by plates of soft-shell crab arancini and lamb kofta skewers with smoked yogurt, all served under low, cinematic lighting and canalside views that shimmer like old dreams.
“At ECC Venice, we believe in the power of creativity and collaboration,” says Xavier Padovani, Partner at Experimental. And in these glasses, you taste not just spirits and syrups, but friendships, cities, and fleeting moments — a world tour distilled in Venice.
For more information on the new cocktail menu, visit the Experimental Cocktail Club Venice official website.
