The Ritz-Carlton’s Republic launches the highly anticipated Volume 2 cocktail menu, which draws inspiration from the art, cinema, fashion and music of the 60’s.
Just shy of their two-year anniversary, Republic has launched a new menu of their niche in creating 60’s inspired cocktails, now focusing on the cultural hallmarks of the influential time. To be specific, they chose the themes of art, cinema, fashion and music to be their source of inspiration, crafting a total of 16 brand new cocktails that celebrate new beginnings, innovation, eternal hits and legends.
As part of the first theme (as seen in the image above), Republic presents drinks that sing praise to the burgeoning inclusivity of art; social and political movements were giving artists more opportunities to grow and express themselves, while the lines between fine and popular became blurred to make way for more experimental and multimedia forms of art.
This includes drinks like “Glass in Bloom” — a well-balanced Sazerac-style cocktail that mixes sous vide beetroot with cognac, and rye whiskey with feta cheese, garnished with stained glass candy — to celebrate glass-blowing maestro Dale Chihuly. Another drink reimagines a local pioneering artist’s penchant for painting fruit baskets with “Georgette” — a gin-based clarified soy milk punch with hints of lychee; and presents a caffeinated spin on an enduring icon that was first created in 1963 with “Mr. Smiley”.
The cinema pillar celebrates the birth of genres like biopics and science fiction, all brought on by the discovery of the space age and big paradigm shifts in the perception of society and culture. Find tropical flavour profiles in the “Lion City”, which was also the first local post-war Chinese film of the same name, while “Space Odyssey” brings a cosmic adventures through every sip, and our inner Audrey Hepburns are summoned with “Breakfast at Tiffany’s”.
For fashion, the drinks look to iconic looks and garments that were popularised from the era, which includes no less than the love for “Polka Dots” and the rockstar-approved “Leather Jacket”. Republic also celebrates the influence of Yves Saint Laurent from the time, creating the “Mondrian” in an homage to his infamously striking haute couture dress, as well as the “Smoking Suit”, a nod to his vision of dressing women androgynously that continues to impact the power dressing of women today.
Last but not least, the music pillar rejoices the advent of rock and roll, psychedelic rock, funk and futuristism. Republic crafts cocktails in The Beatles’ name with “Fab Four”, celebrating the American rock legacy with “Velvet Underground”, while also hoping to introduce more of the sixties’ influential cultural movers that include K-pop’s predecessor the “Kim Sisters”, and an old but significant genre known as “Pop Yeh Yeh”.
On the curation of the new menu, Head Bartender Martin Villareal shares that the approach was to focus on classic cocktail techniques while tweaking the outcome via novel flavour combinations and surprising additions of culinary techniques. “Most importantly, we had to ensure that the narrative behind each cocktail is expressed through its appearance and taste profile,” he said.
We say, let the liquids speak for themselves.
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