Secret Nights 2023 / December 31, 2023 by shane eaton

Joy Napolitano, Gabriele Bagnasacco, Shane Eaton at The Barber Shop Speakeasy (Rome). Photography Massimo Maestri.

In 2023, I had the privilege of organizing a series of events around the world in collaboration with Arnolfo di Cambio and Matiba digital marketing. Dubbed Secret Nights, we celebrated the 60th anniversary of the iconic Italian crystal glassware company Arnolfo di Cambio in the most exclusive cocktail bars around the world. These events would not have been possible without Rossella De Stefano, who kindly put me in touch with Massimo Maestri of Matiba, the visionary behind this exciting project. Massimo was flanked by Account Manager Alessandra De Luca in carrying out this ambitious marketing project. Thank you also for the kind support from Winarto Sutjipto of Arnolfo di Cambio distributor LuxeRoom Singapore.

For each bar, Arnolfo di Cambio CEO Gabriele Bagnasacco and I invited between 10 and 20 distinguished guests, including world renowned designers and artists, cocktail lovers, drinks writers and bon vivants. In total, we held the Secret Nights in eight different cities, including Rome, Milano, London, Singapore, Barcelona, Paris, New York and Florence.

At each venue we served signature cocktails from the respective bars in the Cibi double Old Fashioned glass, a large and beautiful rocks glass ideal for a Negroni, Old Fashioned or for sipping whisky neat. The Cibi Old Fashioned glass was designed by Cini Boeri, a pioneering woman in Italian design and architecture. Boeri was one of three female architecture graduates in 1951 from Politecnico di Milano, my current employer.

The visionary Cibi glass won its place in the history of world cinema thanks to an unknown customer who visited the Arnolfo di Cambio store in Beverly Hills in 1981 and bought several glasses from the Cibi collection. The following year the movie Blade Runner, Ridley Scott’s visionary masterpiece, was released in cinemas. Harrison Ford sipped his whisky in Cini Boeri’s creation, which brought widespread fame to the glass which then took on the nickname the “Blade Runner glass”.

A special thank you to Joy Napolitano, Sandra Cristache and Tommaso Di Spirito of The Barber Shop Speakeasy Rome, Tommaso Cecca and Marco Poletti of Camparino Milano, Salvatore Calabrese and Federico Pavan of The Donovan Bar London, José Domínguez and Indra Kantono of Gibson Bar Singapore, Giacomo Giannotti and Gabriele Armani of Paradiso Barcelona, Timothée Prangé, Alex Francis, Barney O’Kane and Alessio Zenaro of Little Red Door Paris, Harrison Ginsberg of Overstory New York and Tommaso Ondeggia and Edo Sandri of Atrium Bar at the Four Seasons Florence. Without your support, none of this would have been possible!

Thanks to the cocktail lover friends who attended the events including Marialuisa Iannuzzi, Gianni Fontana, Jessica Caputo, Peiyi Chen, Lauren Caramico, Simone Mina, Anthony Poncier, Indra Kantono, Annie Yuan, Cesar Montilla, Xin Ge Liu, Dario Schiavoni and Millie Hanson.

Gianni Fontana, Jessica Caputo and Peiyi Chen at Camparino (Milano). Photography Massimo Maestri.

Millie Hanson, The Donovan Bar at Brown’s Hotel (London)

Shane and Team EDITION at Gibson (Singapore). Photography Larry Lim.

Gabriele Armani at The Macallan Room inside Paradiso (Barcelona)

Shane and Anthony of Le Cocktail Connoisseur/Top 500 Bars at Little Red Door (Paris). Photography Massimo Maestri.

Alessandra De Luca at Four Seasons (Florence)

Paradiso Waste Lab / April 14, 2023 by shane eaton

From 21 to 23 March 2023, the second edition of the Paradiso Sustainability Summit was held in Barcelona. The event was organized by Giacomo Giannotti and Ketel One, and brought together some of the brightest people in the hospitality industry including bar owners, bartenders, food scientists and drinks writers. The common bond among the participants was a desire to share innovative solutions for sustainable practices in the bar industry.

The Summit included three days of activities, with guest shifts and seminars held at Paradiso by Tato Giovannoni and Nahuel Celano of Floreria Atlantico Buenos Aires, Paul Voza and Oliver Ingolf of Himkok Oslo, Alex Francis and Alessio Zenaro of Little Red Door Paris, Agung Prabowo, Laura Prabowo and Saan Dhakal of Penicillin Hong Kong and Matthew Dale of Re Sydney. Penicillin, Re, Himkok and Little Red Door were previous winners of the World’s 50 Best Bars Ketel One Sustainable Bar Award, for their sustainable practices at their respective bars. During the Summit, each unique cocktail menu featured drinks that showcased the bars’ unique concepts, but always maintaining a vision of sustainable bar practices.

On the morning of 21 March, in collaboration with Pachamama, Paradiso organised a beach cleaning activity. In only a half an hour, an astonishing 41 kg of waste was collected at Sant Sebastián beach by the Paradiso Sustainability Summit participants. “By participating in this beach cleaning activity, I think we have made a step forward in having a positive impact on the environment. We have worked together trying to make a difference and push those who follow us to try to preserve our planet for generations to come” said Giacomo Giannotti.

On the same day, the new Paradiso Waste Lab was officially opened and represents the third element of the Paradiso family. Located just across the street from Paradiso, Paradiso Waste Lab, in collaboration with the Plat Institute, has high tech laboratory tools that make it possible to give new life to plastic and in the future, to organic waste. Currently, Paradiso produces around 30 kg of plastic per month, which can be processed and transformed into everyday objects for the bar, such as bottle openers, trays, and coasters. The Paradiso Waste Lab was put into service to reuse the hard plastic recovered from the beach clean up earlier that day. The 7 kg of recovered plastic was transformed by the Paradiso Waste Lab into 280 artisanal coasters for Paradiso bar.

Paradiso Waste Lab not only aims to reduce the environmental impact by recycling and reusing, but also to raise public awareness and demonstrate that a few small steps are enough to help the planet. In the near future, the Paradiso Waste Lab will also be accessible by neighbouring bars that want to embark on a no-waste path.

Giacomo Giannotti summarized his thoughts on The Sustainability Summit “To improve the quality of the environment in which we live, the first step is to involve everyone. The Sustainability Summit is also a time to remind everyone that together we can be part of something bigger and make the world a better place".