The world's best bar is flying in from Mexico City for a 4-day NYC takeover
From Wednesday, September 3 to Saturday, September 6, Handshake Speakeasy, the Mexico City cocktail den currently ranked numer one on The World's 50 Best Bars, will stage an exclusive four-night takeover of MAD Bar & Lounge inside the NH Collection New York Madison Avenue. It's the first time the team has popped up in New York and yes, it's expected to be wildly hard to get in.
If you're not familiar with Handshake, it's not your average speakeasy. Behind an unmarked door in Mexico City's Zona Rosa district, the bar has earned global acclaim for its science-meets-sensory approach to cocktails. Drinks often take 24 to 48 hours to create in the lab-like prep kitchen, where culinary techniques and high-end ingredients combine into what can best be described as liquid wizardry.
Now, they're bringing that same energy (alongside some New York-inspired twists) to Manhattan for four nights only.
'This is not just a cocktail bar—it's a sensory experience,' says Carlos Salomon, the general manager of NH Collection New York Madison Avenue. 'We're proud to host a world-class team that's redefining what it means to enjoy a drink.'
While the exact cocktail menu remains under wraps, you can expect high-concept presentation, inventive ingredients and a few exclusive collaborations that may never appear again. MAD Bar will be reimagined for the occasion, with limited seating and an intimate vibe designed to let the drinks (and drama) shine.
Reservations open Sunday, August 3 via Resy, and priority will be given to hotel guests, so if you're desperate to score a seat, consider booking a room.
In a city where great bars are everywhere, this may be your only chance to sip from the top shelf—literally.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Daily Mail
31 minutes ago
- Daily Mail
Grammy-winning jazz musician Chuck Mangione behind hit single Feels So Good dead at 84
Legendary jazz musician Chuck Mangione, the man behind the international hit single Feels So Good, has died at the age of 84. The trumpet and flugelhorn player landed his breakthrough in the 1960s performing for bandleader Art Blakely, before becoming a star in his own right. He won two Grammy Awards over the course of his decades-long career, and his music was included in two Olympic ceremonies. Mangione's 1977 album Feels So Good, which contained the full nine-minute version of the instrumental title track, rocketed to number two on the Billboard 200. When a truncated three-minute single of Feels So Good was released the following year, it too rose to become a thunderous smash success. He died this week of natural causes at home in his upstate New York hometown of Rochester, his manager informed TMZ. Charles Frank Mangione was born in 1940 in Rochester and fell in love with jazz thanks to his father Frank, a grocer who was an avid fan of the genre. Mangione's father 'would take my brother Gap and me to Sunday-afternoon matinees at the jazz clubs,' he fondly recalled. 'When I was a kid, there were hordes of wonderful small group - Miles Davis' band, Cannonball Adderley's band, Sonny Rollins' band, Sarah Vaughan, Carmen McRae, Charlie Ventura.' The musical stars who came to town often wound up at the Mangione home for dinner at the invitation of young Chuck's father. 'At that time, there were two TV stations and two movies in town. The musicians were in town for two weeks, so when they found out that they could come over to our place and hear a good record collection, have some homemade pasta and some good Italian red, it wasn't too hard to get them to come by,' said Mangione. 'It happened so often, so regularly, that it took me years to realize how significant it was. And I kind of grew up thinking that every kid had Carmen McRae or Art Blakey at his house,' he confessed to the Los Angeles Times. Mangione's own early career in the 1960s included working with his pianist brother Gap, as well as a trumpeter in Art Blakely's group the Jazz Messengers. However his true stardom arrived in the 1970s, the decade he began collaborating with saxophonist Gerry Niewood as part of a quartet. 'For a long time I lived in the shell of the so–called jazz musician, who said: "To hell with the people. I'm the artist, I know what's right, and I'm going to play for myself. If they like it, fine; if they don't, too bad,"' Mangione remarked in 1972. 'Well, that's partially true, but you can still maintain your musical conviction and try to communicate with people. For me, lifting the people up, making them enjoy what we're doing is as important as it is for me to play the kind of music I want to play. Both are very possible.' During that decade he won his two Grammys, first in 1977 for his instrumental composition Bellavia, the title of which was his mother's middle name. His second Grammy was for playing on the soundtrack for the 1978 Anthony Quinn movie The Children of Sanchez, for which Mangione also wrote the score. The 1976 Summer Olympics in Montreal included Mangione's composition Chase the Clouds Away - and four years later, the theme song for the Winter Olympics in Lake Placid, New York was another Mangione original called Give It All You Got. Mangione's beloved father Frank 'Papa' Mangione, who used to joke that he 'played the cash register,' retired from the grocery store business in 1975 and went on tour with his jazz musician sons, hawking their merchandise on the road. Over a career in which he released 30 albums and earned 14 Grammy nods, Chuck Mangione's crowning success was the album Feels So Good and its title single. After the full LP emerged as a galloping success in 1977, Mangione was faced with the task of trimming its more than nine-minute title track to the length of a single. 'We did major surgery on Feels So Good and cut it down to three minutes,' the musical artist explained in the 1990s. 'Then, without my knowing it, the engineer thought it might be a hair too slow and cranked it up a half a step in pitch. I didn't find out until I went on a radio show and the deejay asked me to play along with it. I said: "Sure," and then I discovered it was a half-tone higher. I said: "What? I'm half a step flat." But it worked.' In an era dominated by disco and rock 'n' roll, Mangione's instrumental jazz single soared to number four on the Billboard Hot 100, a crossover triumph that he himself readily described in retrospect as a 'fluke.' The track passed into musical history, featured on the soundtracks of projects ranging from The Big Bang Theory and Doctor Strange. Mangione also earned a firm position as a pop culture icon of sorts, to the point he memorably played himself on the beloved animated series King of the Hill. With his trademark top hat constantly on and his trumpet regularly in hand, Mangione was unmistakable even in cartoon format. His memorial services at the Bartolomeo & Perreto Funeral Home in upstate New York are to be kept private, according to the local outlet Rochester First.
.jpeg%3Ftrim%3D314%2C0%2C315%2C0%26width%3D1200%26height%3D800%26crop%3D1200%3A800&w=3840&q=100)
The Independent
an hour ago
- The Independent
From Wrestlemania to MAGA-land: Hulk Hogan and Donald Trump's friendship through the years
President Donald Trump 's decades-long friendship with Hulk Hogan was forged over a love of professional wrestling but developed into a political alliance that eventually culminated in Hogan earning a spot in the president's trusted circle. Beginning in the 1980s, the two men embarked on parallel journeys to ultimate fame in their respective careers while maintaining a relationship that benefitted one another. Hogan, whose real name is Terry Bollea, died on July 24 at the age of 71. The president remembered his 'great friend' in a post on Truth Social, calling him 'strong, tough, smart, but with the biggest heart.' 'He entertained fans from all over the World, and the cultural impact he had was massive,' Trump said. 'To his wife, Sky, and family, we give our warmest best wishes and love. Hulk Hogan will be greatly missed!' A start in the wrestling world Trump and Hogan first met in the 1980s when both were budding celebrities known for their over-the-top ways. Hogan, standing at 6'7' and weighing approximately 300 pounds, was a wrestling star who headlined multiple WrestleMania events, including WrestleMania IV and V held at Trump Plaza in 1989. Trump, a titan of the real estate industry of New York at the time, sponsored the events and sat ringside. 'My first interaction with Trump was WrestleMania four and five, and you know, I didn't think he'd come to the show. But he was there early, came in the dressing room, met all the wrestlers,' Hogan told PBD Podcast last year while recalling his first meeting with Trump. At WrestleMania V, Trump once again sat ringside, this time watching as Hogan defeated André the Giant. 'He's the same guy now that he was back then,' Hogan told PBD Podcast. 'He hasn't changed a bit. I mean, he's just a quality person.' The transition to the MAGA world Hogan wasn't always a MAGA Republican; in fact, he endorsed former president Barack Obama up until his re-election in 2012. After that, Hogan changed his tune and when Trump stepped into the political ring as a candidate contender in 2016, Hogan jumped on board. While he did not issue a public endorsement of Trump until 2024, Hogan said he did support Trump in 2016. The only hint of that Hogan gave publicly was in 2015 when he suggested he could be Trump's running mate. 'I don't want to be in the ring with any candidates, I want to be Trump's running mate," Hogan told TMZ at the time when asked which 2016 candidate he would get into the ring with. "Did you hear that?" he said. "Vice President Hogan?" Ultimately, Trump went with Mike Pence as his running mate. But Hogan would eventually make an appearance on stage with Trump when he spoke at the 2024 Republican National Convention and Trump's Madison Square Garden rally. But in between Trump's 2016 presidential win and 2024 presidential win, Hogan experienced some life events that brought him closest to the MAGA world. In 2016, Hogan filed a $100 million lawsuit against former pop culture blog Gawker for publishing an excerpt of his sex tape. The lawsuit was backed by billionaire Peter Thiel, who had also been subjected to gossip spread by Gawker after the online blog outed him. Hogan eventually won the lawsuit, initially for $140 million, but settled with Gawker for $31 million. That ultimately led to Gawker 's closing. The lawsuit occurred at the same time Trump was unleashing his anger at the media, branding many as 'fake news.' Some, including Brian Knappenberger, who directed a documentary on Hogan's lawsuit, believed there were 'direct parallels' between the Gawker suit and Trump's rise to fame. 'MAGA all the way' Hogan decided to use his theatrical personality to endorse and advocate for Trump at the RNC after seeing the president survive an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania. 'As an entertainer, I try to stay out of politics,' Hogan said on stage at the convention, wearing a red bandana. 'But after everything that's happened to our country over the past four years, and everything that happened last weekend, I can no longer stay silent.' Tapping into his entertainment background, Hogan decided to endorse the president by yelling into the microphone while ripping his shirt off with his bare hands to reveal a 'Trump Vance 2024' tank top underneath, flexing his muscles the entire time. 'Let TrumpMania run wild, brother!' he shouted. 'Let TrumpMania rule again! Let TrumpMania make America great again!' In remembering his friend, Trump recalled Hogan's 'absolutely electric speech' at the RNC. 'That was one of the highlights of the entire week,' Trump said after Hogan's death. Hogan tapped into that same energy again in October 2024 – this time wearing a red and yellow feathered boa. 'We lost a great friend today, the 'Hulkster,'' Trump said after his death. 'Hulk Hogan was MAGA all the way.'
Daily Mail
an hour ago
- Daily Mail
Waiter's bombshell claim New York's hottest restaurant is a hotbed of sexual depravity: Cocaine in spray bottles and 'anything goes'
The Polo Bar is considered one of New York's most coveted dining destinations. Celebrities and the Big Apple's elite sip on $67 martinis - served on a silver platter with oysters and caviar - in dimly lit booths.
