Bar Leone

The bellini comes in a tumbler, not a flute

Order the bellini at Bar Leone and it arrives in a small tumbler, the way Harry's Bar in Venice has served it for decades — almond eau de vie under the peach, a cap of cream on top. It's the clearest signal of what founder Lorenzo Antinori built on Bridges Street when he opened in June 2023: a "bar popolare," a Roman neighbourhood bar, not a cocktail laboratory. The house menu is called Cocktail Popolari — Italian pop-culture drinks, built low-intervention, on classic technique and ingredients that don't need a story told over them.

It's the first Hong Kong bar to top the World's 50 Best list

Bar Leone was named The World's Best Bar 2025 in October 2025 — first place, worldwide, the first time a Hong Kong bar has taken the title. The ceremony was held at Kai Tak Cruise Terminal, in the city that won. Asia's 50 Best Bars 2026 put it at #3 and named it Best Bar in Hong Kong. It has also picked up a Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Award for Best International Bar Team and Tatler's Bar of the Year.

There's no reservation to make

Bar Leone runs walk-in only — no bookings, any night. It opens daily at 5pm on Bridges Street in Central and keeps going, in the bar's own words, "until late." That's part of the popolare idea: turn up, find a stool or don't, and the room sorts itself out the way a neighbourhood bar always has.