The poor old pangolin, now the world’s most trafficked animal, is receiving a boost this Christmas from an unlikely source: the cocktail drinkers of London.
“With its armoured shell and peculiar gait,” says The Daily Telegraph, it “looks more like an anteater prepped for medieval battle than an animal under threat.” But the threat is severe: an estimated 100,000 of the creatures are killed each year for their scales, which are used in traditional Asian medicine.
The link between a chic West End cocktail bar and a creature on the brink of extinction is not as tenuous as it might at first seem. The Kensington Hotel has always had a soft spot for exotic animals, as embodied in the large sculpted elephants occupying the lobby. Its Christmas tree, too, is decorated with scaled baubles and ornamental angel-winged animals, hand crafted by the African jewellery makers Patrick Mavros.
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
They’re also the company behind the decorative swizzle-sticks that come with the Plight of the Pangolin, the fresh and citrussy Elephant Gin-based cocktail on sale in the hotel’s K-Bar throughout the festive period. The Tikki Hywood Foundation, which releases rescued pangolins into the wild and campaigns for their protection, will receive 15% of the price of the cocktail (and Elephant Gin also donates 15% of its proceeds to elephant conservation work).
The initiative is part of the Doyle Collection of luxury urban hotels’ Slice of the City initiative, which is intended to immerse guests in the culture, history and shops around them. Patrick Mavros’s flagship London store is in Chelsea, just around the corner from The Kensington.
The K-Bar is at The Kensington Hotel, London SW7
Continue reading for free
We hope you're enjoying The Week's refreshingly open-minded journalism.
Subscribed to The Week? Register your account with the same email as your subscription.
-
Ten Things You Need to Know Today: 23 September 2023The Week’s daily digest of the news agenda, published at 8am
-
Pinochet’s coup in Chile 50 years on
The Explainer Half a century on, the former leader still sharply divides opinion in his home country
-
The Week Unwrapped: Ghost tankers, loyalty cards and contempt
Podcast Should we be worried about illicit oil tankers? What are the limits to protests outside court? And are supermarket loyalty schemes all they seem?
-
Black Atlantic: Power, People, Resistance review
The Week Recommends Fitzwilliam Museum exhibition features lives affected by the Atlantic slave trade
-
Private Lives review: a 'witty' revival of Noël Coward's classic comedy
The Week Recommends Patricia Hodge and Nigel Havers play the warring exes in this 'delicious retro treat'
-
Wilderness review: a soapy drama set in the American southwest
The Week Recommends Amazon series starring Jenna Coleman and Oliver Jackson-Cohen is 'full of twists'
-
Volkswagen ID.5 review: what the car critics say
Feature The ID.4's 'sportier, more stylish twin' – but 'don't believe the hype'
-
Jamaica Inn review: a small patch of Caribbean heaven
The Week Recommends Guests will feel like one of the family at this boutique beach resort in Ocho Rios
-
Scottish Women Artists review
The Week Recommends Exhibition uncovers the work of female artists long hidden in 'historical obscurity'
-
Dracula: Mina's Reckoning review
The Week Recommends A groundbreaking and distinctively Scottish retelling of Bram Stoker's classic novel
-
Top Boy review: a fitting finale to the gangland drama
The Week Recommends This brilliant show is bowing out at exactly the right time – at the top
