ANDY GRIFFITHS
Head of Operations and Creative at Idlewild
Kiwi-born Andy Griffiths used to spend his childhood watching his mother maximise their orchard’s fruit, fromom freezing juice cubes to making jams with them. He now brings the same sustainability principles to the newly opened Idlewild, a retro-luxe cocktail bar located in the lobby of Intercontinental Singapore. Andy oversees everything, from drinks creation to music programming to fit the bar’s theme of celebrating the golden age of air travel, from the 1940s to the 1960s.
In the last 20 years, the award-winning bartender, who started off as a chef, has had an illustrious career, including being crowned Chartreuse Chevalier in 2014, and making spirited champs out of cocktail bars in Sydney and Melbourne such as Eau devie, Mjolner and Nick & Nora’s, all under Australia’s The Speakeasy Group. He says: “A modern cocktail bar needs to have a well-curated bar stock, and a good understanding of ingredients and culinary techniques, from fermentation to sustainability. A worldly outlook is also important as customers expect you to have information at your fingertips to create the drinks they enjoy.”
Food Fervour
“My wife and I would go anywhere for food. We had a two-month trip through Europe in 2011 where we ate nothing but pizza for two days in Naples, and toured central Italy for parmesan, Parma ham and aceto balsamico (original Italian wine vinegar and grape must concentrate) before drinking Campari and vermouths in Milan and Turin. Then in France, we had as much champagne and cheese as we could fit in. The worst thing we ever ate was during our honeymoon in 2014, where we had duck embryo and local rice wine. We couldn’t bring ourselves to finish it.”
Cutting Edge
“I love collecting blades and my collection includes daggers from the Middle
East. A friend once brought me a 1.9m-long Maasai hunting spear as a gift all the way from Darwin to Melbourne. He was a sailor who worked on a superyacht and had bartered something for it near the Port of Zanzibar.”
“My favourite drink is chartreuse served neat, in a Last Word cocktail or with a Tiki twist. It’s a great drink for celebrations or catch‑up with friends.”