AN EXPERT'S TOUCH

Award-winning mixologist, Nico de Soto joins Thomas Ashbourne Craft Spirits

Thomas Ashbourne Craft Spirits proudly announces that renown, award-winning mixologist, Nico de Soto, has joined the team as creative director. Nico will bring his extensive expertise to the ready-to drink, premium cocktail brand which launched earlier this summer. Nico will share tips on how to best serve the Thomas Ashbourne portfolio with an expert mixologist’s take on the high proof, high quality cocktails. With a renown cocktail expert, a stacked team of celebrity taste making founding partners like Sarah Jessica Parker, John Cena and Vanessa Hudgens, and a lineup of classic cocktails with a modern twist, Thomas Ashbourne is primed to start shaking up the spirits world. Parisian born and raised, Nico first began bartending in Paris in 2005 where he was trained in the art of classic cocktails. Nico crafted the art of perfecting libations in Australia, before joining Paris’s most respected cocktail bars, the Experimental Cocktail Club and Curio Parlor. In 2010 Nico joined the opening teams at Dram and PKNY (former Painkiller) in New York and then became the head mixologist of the Experimental Group, opening the Experimental Cocktail Club in London and New York, respectively nominated 3rd best bar in Europe 2012 at Cocktail Spirits Awards and

top 4 finalists World’s Best New Bar in 2013 at Tales of Cocktails and 26th best cocktail bar in the world by Drinks International. In 2013, Nico worked at the awarded 69 Colebrooke Row and Happiness Forgets in London, names respectively Best Bar in the World at Tales of the Cocktails and 6th Best Bar in the World by Drinks International 2013. In 2015, he opened his first cocktail bar Mace in East Village in New York ranked 28th best bar in the World at Drinks International World’s Top 50 Best Bars, for the fourth year in a row. In 2016, he opened in Paris Danico, in the heart of the Italian trattoria Daroco, with his two restaurateur friends Julien Ross and Alexandre Giesbert. In 2018, he opened Kaido in the Design District of Miami with James Beard’s awards multi-nominated chef Brad Kilgore, a Japanese influenced cocktail lounge. Thomas Ashbourne raises the bar in the world of ready-to-sip craft cocktails with rich flavors curated by iconic partners who know their way around a top shelf cocktail. Every batch is sustainably handcrafted in the U.S. using all-natural, Kosher ingredients and crafted in small batches and tailored to the palates of esteemed partners. They use less water, agricultural land and CO2 than others in in field. For more info, visit thomasashbourne.com and follow on: Facebook @ ThomasAshbourne, Instagram @ thomasashbourne, and Twitter @ thomasashbourne.

The Classic Old Fashioned The Margalicious Margarita The Hardscatto The Perfect Cosmo by SJP

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The PR%F Awards

Great spirits flowed together in camaraderie and unique tastings when spirit industry leaders gathered to judge the PR%F Awards 2021, 2020, and 2019. Officially named the world’s largest spirits and wine competition in the US, PR%F Awards 2021 encompassed innovation with judging. PR%F Awards 2021 launched a new dual adult beverage competition format including two competitions in one—PR%F Awards-Masked, The DoubleBlind Tasting, and PR%F Awards-Unmasked, The Total Package. It has been three years of incredible tastings, new partnerships and the fun of Las Vegas with more to come.