Nottingham Forest

A Corner of Viale Piave That Changed How Italy Thinks About Cocktails

Milan's cocktail culture has always operated on two distinct registers: the aperitivo tradition, built around low-cost Campari and bitters consumed before dinner, and a smaller, more technically ambitious tier of bars that operate on international competitive terms. Nottingham Forest sits in the second register, and has done so consistently enough that its address on Viale Piave, in the residential fabric of the Porta Venezia district, has become a reference point for anyone tracking where Italian bartending stands against a global peer set.

Approaching from the boulevard, there is nothing about the exterior that signals the awards history inside. That understatement is characteristic of the bars in Milan that operate at this level: 1930 runs a deliberate entry protocol; Camparino in Galleria relies on its Galleria location to do the atmospheric work. Nottingham Forest relies on neither concealment nor setting. The space is the product, and the product has been consistent long enough to have earned multiple World's 50 Best Bars placements across nearly a decade.

What the Awards Record Actually Tells You

The bar's position on the World's 50 Best Bars list is worth reading carefully. An entry in 2010 at number 48 was followed by a climb to number 15 in 2012, a return to 15 in 2014, and then a gradual retreat through the forties before the list relationship faded. By 2025, the bar appears at number 268 in the broader Top 500 Bars ranking. That arc is not a story of decline so much as a story of how the global cocktail bar field has expanded around a fixed point. The bars that now occupy the leading twenty of any international ranking are, in most cases, operations that were still opening when Nottingham Forest was in its competitive prime.

For context within Italy, the bar occupies a peer set that includes Drink Kong in Rome, which represents the newer generation of Italian cocktail programs built on similar technical ambition, and L'Antiquario in Naples, which anchors its program in antiquarian spirits and a distinct southern Italian identity. Nottingham Forest predates both in terms of international recognition, and its Google rating of 4.4 across nearly 3,000 reviews suggests the audience has not moved on, even as the competitive landscape has shifted around it.

The Sourcing Logic Behind the Program

The editorial angle assigned to any serious bar in this tier is increasingly about ingredients: where the raw materials come from, how they enter the glass, and whether the sourcing philosophy is coherent or performative. Milan is well-placed for this kind of program. The city sits within reach of the alpine herb traditions that inform vermouth and amaro production to the north and west, and within reasonable distance of citrus-growing regions to the south. A bar operating at Nottingham Forest's level in this city has access to a sourcing geography that most northern European cocktail programs can only approximate.

What distinguishes serious ingredient sourcing in a cocktail context is not the provenance label on a bottle but the degree to which the bar's production process treats botanical, citrus, and spirit inputs as starting points rather than finished components. The bars currently operating in this way across Europe, from Lost and Found in Nicosia to Bar Leather Apron in Honolulu, share a method: they house-produce infusions, cordials, or clarifications that would be impossible to replicate from commercial stock. Whether Nottingham Forest operates on a comparable production model is a question leading answered at the bar itself, but its sustained placement across multiple years of a technically rigorous award panel suggests the program was never built on off-the-shelf assembly.

For Italian bars more broadly, the sourcing question connects to a longer tradition. Italy's drinking culture has always been ingredient-forward in the sense that amaro, vermouth, and aperitivo formats are themselves distillations of regional botanicals into consumable form. Moebius Milano represents one contemporary expression of that logic. Antica Trattoria della Pesa connects the drinking tradition to the table in a different register entirely. Nottingham Forest sits somewhere between those poles: its identity is unmistakably that of a cocktail bar, but it operates in a city where the line between a glass and an ingredient has always been more porous than in London or New York.

Where Nottingham Forest Sits in Milan's Evening Geography

Porta Venezia is a neighbourhood that has accumulated a density of bars, restaurants, and cultural spaces over the past decade without losing the residential texture that makes it feel lived-in rather than curated for visitors. The address on Viale Piave places Nottingham Forest within walking distance of several distinct bar typologies: aperitivo-led neighbourhood spots, wine bars that shade into enoteca territory, and the occasional format that crosses both. For visitors using the bar as a first stop on a wider Milan evening, the neighbourhood rewards walking. For those coming specifically, the bar operates Tuesday through Saturday from 18:30 and on Sundays from 18:00, with Mondays closed.

That hours structure places it in the evening-only tier, which is consistent with a program that treats the cocktail as the primary product rather than a supplement to food service. The 18:30 opening on weeknights aligns with the tail end of aperitivo hour in the city, which means the transition from a lighter, lower-alcohol first drink at a neighbourhood bar to something more considered at Nottingham Forest is a plausible evening logic.

Italy's Cocktail Bars and the Broader European Context

The trajectory of Nottingham Forest across the World's 50 Best Bars list maps onto a broader shift in how European cocktail bars have been evaluated and how they have evolved. The early 2010s were a period when a small number of bars in each major European city were absorbing techniques from the molecular gastronomy tradition, applying clarification, fat-washing, and vacuum infusion to spirits in ways that required laboratory equipment as much as bartending skill. The bars that peaked in that period, including Nottingham Forest at number 15 in 2012 and 2014, were operating at the experimental frontier of what a cocktail could be.

The current frontier has moved, as frontiers do, toward fermentation, hyper-local sourcing, and a more explicit conversation between the bar program and the food culture of its city or region. Gucci Giardino in Florence situates its program inside a luxury fashion house's cultural identity. Al Covino in Venice operates in a city where the aperitivo tradition is so deeply embedded that any bar program must position itself in relation to it. Enoteca Storica Faccioli in Bologna takes a different route entirely, anchoring the drinking experience in natural wine rather than mixed drinks. Against that range, Nottingham Forest's identity as a dedicated cocktail bar with an international awards history remains a specific and legible position in a market that has fragmented considerably since its peak years.

For a fuller account of where the bar sits within Milan's wider drinking and dining offer, the EP Club Milan guide maps the city across categories and neighbourhoods.

Planning Your Visit

Nottingham Forest operates at Viale Piave 1, in the Porta Venezia district of Milan. The bar is closed on Mondays. Tuesday through Saturday, service runs from 18:30 to 02:00. Sunday hours are 18:00 to 01:00. No booking method is listed in the venue record, and at 4.4 across close to 3,000 reviews, this is a bar with a steady volume of visitors. Arriving early in the evening session on a weeknight is a practical approach if a quieter experience is the preference. Price range data is not available in EP Club's current record, but the bar's position in an international awards tier positions it above the aperitivo-bar price point typical of the surrounding neighbourhood.

Frequently Asked Questions

What drink is Nottingham Forest famous for?

The bar built its reputation across multiple World's 50 Best Bars placements, peaking at number 15 in both 2012 and 2014, on a technically ambitious cocktail program that absorbed the molecular and precision-infusion methods that defined the early 2010s frontier. No single signature drink is cited in public records, but the program's repeated recognition by a technically rigorous judging panel points to a mixed drinks offer built around house production rather than standard assembly. The bar is associated with the broader tradition of Italian ingredient-led bartending, drawing on the botanical and aperitivo heritage that Milan's drinking culture has long supported.

What is Nottingham Forest leading at?

Sustained credibility across a long competitive window. The bar entered the World's 50 Best Bars list in 2010 and held positions through 2016, with two appearances at number 15. In a city with serious cocktail competition at bars including 1930 and Camparino in Galleria, maintaining that kind of awards presence over multiple years requires a program that consistently delivers at a technical level. For visitors, that translates to a cocktail bar experience in the Porta Venezia district that has been validated by both a 4.4 Google rating across nearly 3,000 reviews and a decade of international award recognition. Price range data is not available in the current EP Club record.