Sastrería Martínez no longer needs a password: the new proposal from the award-winning bar

LOOK: Maras, a restaurant with a menu against the predictable

The format was born with that formula: behind a tailor shop that seemed real, a low-lit bar with velvet armchairs. Over the years, under the guidance of its founder, Diego Macedo, it stopped relying on the disguise to sustain itself on something else: a cocktail bar with criteria, technique, and an idea behind each menu. The result of that shift is measured today in concrete numbers — it ranks 33rd in The World’s 50 Best Bars 2025 — but is better understood by trying its new menu.

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Collection 26/27 is a reading of Peruvian textiles, from the loom to the glass. The menu is organized into six territories and each drink is conceived as a garment — fiber, technique, sewing — rather than as a trendy list of ingredients. The menu is a well-designed artifact, where the garments appear silhouetted and a die-cut lets you see and feel the fabrics. It is a concept that, in the hands of another bar, would be pure discourse, but here the technique supports the idea.

The Trazo cocktail, with Tanqueray gin infused with lemon verbena, lime cordial and seaweed, quince and oxalis, is the most mineral drink on the table: citrusy, dry; the kind of cocktail that shows “refreshing” doesn’t have to mean “simple.” Shiringa, with aguaje gin and elderberry liqueur, lucuma and acerola liqueur, goes for the sour side, with a well-calibrated acidity that doesn’t hide behind the fruit. Torsión, made with rum, watermelon syrup and ají charapita, guava, lime and paico, takes a risk with the spiciness without losing the herbal axis: it’s one of those drinks you remember even afterwards. Bastilla is the most serious of the collection: The Macallan 12, huacatay vermouth, sachatomate. It is a dry, mineral cocktail, designed for those who don’t want a dessert in a glass. Mr. Martínez, on the other hand, plays on the other side: 18-year-old whisky, vermouth, cranberry and coffee syrup, papaya lactoferment and cinnamon. In El Brujo, with Johnnie Walker Ruby, Mandarine Napoléon, loche orgeat, lulo, lemon bitters, there is a citrus-spiced base that crosses with the whisky, while the loche orgeat and lulo lower the proof and add a local touch.

The food supports the proposal without seeking the spotlight. The sando de lomo fino in the Japanese style and the pork belly buns with charapita honey show that the bar understood something many still don’t: bar snacks don’t have to be a separate menu; they need to be precise. The corn cakes with trout tartare and the three-cheese quinoa croquettes fulfill that same function of support. Something tasty, easy to enjoy, without having to think much and without taking the focus away from the cocktail proposal. But always with high-quality ingredients and good technique management.

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What is clear is that Sastrería Martínez has already solved the hardest question: how to surprise when you are no longer a surprise. The answer, this time wrapped in Peruvian textiles, is simple: start defending what is behind the door. //