The Bee's Knees first appeared in print in 1936, in a cocktail book called The Artistry of Mixing Drinks — written by Frank Meier, an Austrian-born bartender working at Bar Hemingway inside the Ritz-Carlton in Nazi-occupied Paris. Meier was under Gestapo surveillance. They knew he had Jewish roots and suspected he was passing messages to the German Resistance — which he was. What they didn't know was that he was also forging identity documents for people trying to flee occupied France.

In between all of that, he found time to write down the Bee's Knees.

The drink survived the war, outlasted every cocktail trend that followed, and is now having its finest hour. The International Bartenders Association named it an official New Era Drink in 2020. Industry forecasters place it alongside the Espresso Martini as one of the defining cocktails of 2026. Three ingredients — gin, lemon, honey — and nearly a century of proof.

For Barr Hill, it was never just a cocktail. Raw northeastern honey isn't an ingredient we add to Barr Hill Gin — it's a fermentable that shapes the spirit from within. Every bottle exists because pollinators exist. The Bee's Knees is the drink this gin was made for.