Photos: The Spirits Masters Lunch 2014
Guests were given the opportunity to meet and congratulate one another over a cocktail or two, and in a rather festive setting, before sitting down to lunch.
BarChick’s Hannah Lodge (left), with The Benevolent’s David Cox and Margaret Lodge.
The Moët Hennessy crew, including Mayfox Communications founder Emily Harris, Moët Hennessy corporate communications manager Serena Williams and Steve Small, development manager of travel retail at the Glenorangie Company, enjoyed a few pre-dinner cocktails
Pepijn Vanden Abeele, bar manager of Coburg at The Connaught Hotel, Oleh Bashutskyy, sales director, Snow Queen, and Micke Sweetman, London area chairman of the United Kingdom Bartenders’ Association (UKBG).
The Lodge family – Margaret, Kathryn and Hannah – present SB’s Amy Hopkins (second from left) with her award for the Alan Lodge Young International Spirits Writer of the Year Award. Ian Taylor, head of marketing GTR at William Grant & Sons (far right), announced her prize as a trip to one of the group’s distilleries for a new product launch next year.
Joining award-winning brands at the lunch were some of our judges, including Luca Cordiglieri, head bartender at China Tang at The Dorchester (left), and president of the UKBG, with Pritesh Mody, founder of World of Zing.
Our guests were in high spirits as they sat down for lunch at the beautiful Kensington Roof Gardens.
Just a small selection of the award-winning spirits given Spirits Masters medals throughout the year.
Purity Vodka chairman Goran Bernhoff, and founder and master distiller Thomas Kuuttanen flick through the latest issue of The Spirits Business.
Some of the biggest names from across the spirits industry attended the bash at Kensington Roof Gardens in London.
Desmond Payne, master distiller of Beefeater, delights in reading the December issue of The Spirits Business.
Duncan Hayter, European representative of High Spirits SL, is given the low-down on the event by SB staff writer Melita Kiely ahed of picking up awards for Don Q and Ron de Jeremy Rum.
The finale of the day was the bestowment of the award for Grand Spirit Master 2014, which went to Purity Vodka. Accepting the award from SB associate publisher Daisy Jones (second from left) and editor Becky Paskin (third from left) were Goran Bernhoff (far left) and Thomas Kuuttanen (far right).
