This is Toni, the robotic bartender who prepares your aperitif
The future is here and this hackneyed phrase has also reached the world of cocktails, where it seems to advance by leaps and bounds. The last to arrive is Tony, to Milan.
Let's put ourselves in situation. You are in the capital of fashion, in the sought-after ** The View , the rooftop of one of the most exclusive hotels, the TownHouse Duomo.** Evening falls on the cathedral and you approach the bar.
Who serves you the appetizer? Tony. But he doesn't look at you, he doesn't talk to you, because Toni is not a barman but an elegant robot with two mechanical arms and 158 different bottles. on the roof of it, he prepares up to 80 drinks in an hour in a hypnotic and millimetrically designed dance of movements.
The installation, those two mechanical arms that are already beginning to replace bartenders all over the world, is the work of the robotic mechanics engineer, Emanuele Rosseti, halfway with his partner Carlo Ratti, professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, his name is makr shakr , and already operates on some cruise ships Royal Caribbean , somewhere in Las Vegas , in the london barbican , and in the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino in Biloxi, Mississippi.
He has been operating in Milan for a couple of months “as a tribute to the city that created the aperitif”, explains Rosseti, and it is being a complete success.
The creators of it, who sell or rent them from their own website where you can choose between Toni or Bruno, from €99,000, they promise to change the concept of fun in cities with robotic drinks.
On the luminous screen that the Toni on duty has incorporated, they are indicated in real time at what point your cocktail is, and the best thing, using the Makr Shakr mobile app, you select recipes yourself from a list of creations developed by international bartenders, or even create and name your own custom cocktails.
The result? You are the bartender just by using your mobile phone (for iOS and Android devices) and in addition to placing the order, you can make the payment instantly.
Where are they the look, the comment and the magic of approaching the bar and have a laugh with the barman –if he lends himself, of course–? Does not exist. Where the little look from top to bottom when you turn around to assess the quality of native genetics? It's over…
Once the cocktail is chosen, those mechanical arms that don't really tell us much, they mix the ingredients, stir them, shake them and serve them impeccably, without a smile (in this he does not differ much from some bartenders I know) .
Capable of crushing ice, cutting lemons, chopping mint, dispensing sugar... the Tonis say they are inspired by the elegance of movements of the Italian dancer and choreographer Marco Pelle , who works at the New York Theater Ballet, and who, according to the child's parents, is another Italian born in Vicenza in an attempt to add some kind of curiosity to the matter.
To check the efficiency of the machines against those of meat and bone, this summer a curious competition was organized in London: barman against robots.
The result? Humans continued to supersede machines in the number of cocktails served and in smiles, I'm not even telling you... That yes… for now.
As the number of cocktails these machines can serve, increasingly sophisticated, has been on the rise since the first began to appear, almost a decade ago.
And it is that the most apocalyptic have already been announcing it for years: the mechanical works , especially in the entertainment and services industry, they will disappear in little more than a century at the hands of robots.
They will assist us in hotels, restaurants, bars... We have already seen DJs, bartenders... but they have been present in the universe of exploration and services for years, capable of providing practical solutions for the cities of the future.
What will be next?
MILANO DA BERE. WHERE?
While all of this is going on, whether or not you're staying at the **TownHouse Duomo**, whether or not you're served by a robot, You have to come to Milan to drink and to The View, the rooftop, to try one of its aperitifs with a view
Although it was not exactly in Milan where the aperitif was invented, but everyone agrees in pointing to Antonio Benedetto Carpano (inventor of vermouth) in Turin , this is the city that has popularized it.
To put it into practice, you cannot miss it on the list a Negroni (gin, vermouth and Campari) and above all, the aperol spritz (Aperol, champagne and soda) and accompany it with some suggestive snack (there is everything) although sausages are king and by the way you taste the variety that is many and very joyful.
Among the places you cannot miss are **the classics like the Terrazza Aperol or the Bar Basso** (both legendary) but also **other more contemporary places like the MAG Café**, an old pharmacy converted into a temple of the aperitif; ** Ostello Bello **, very entertaining low cost version; ** Ceresio 7 **, rooftop with pool included; ** Fonderie Milanesi **, an old factory today an international meeting point o the quaint Back Door 43, the world's smallest bar that only fits two people.
Other luxurious views to take an Aperol Spritz are those of La Rinascente Food & Restaurant , on the top floor of an exclusive shopping center also overlooking the Duomo.