Many bars now employing sustainable practices, but some go deeper than others. One such bar is our winner: Ugly Butterfly by Adam Handling in St Ives, Cornwall.
Chef Adam Handling’s most westerly outpost places Cornish ingredients on a pedestal, while making an enemy of waste. Underpinning the work at Ugly Butterfly is the belief that local is the new luxury, and while this is no foreign concept to restaurants, it is less charted territory in the world of bars.
But from this seaside idyll, the idea of a rural bar and all the challenges and advantages that come with it has rarely been so viscerally compelling.
Restriction has been upturned to advantage, with director of bars Josh Linfitt proudly listing local award-winning cider, Cornish beer and wine.
Even his cocktails draw on Cornish ingredients, with citrus from Cornish farms, and tropical fruits, plants, teas and grasses now coming from the nearby Eden Project. The approach showcases the best of British farming and craftsmanship – and the people behind the products too.
Finalists: Henrock, Windermere; The American Bar, Gleneagles; Christina’s Shoreditch, London